first ‘long’ run this year

well, there it was…first ‘long’ run today…up to this point runs although ‘intense’, have been just over an hour…well, today was long’ish at 9.6 miles (15.4 km) in 1:32 (9:35/mile 5:57/km pace), so a rational pace for the workout spec, with 2 x 1/2 mile @ 9:00/mile pace, and 2 x 1 mile in a 8:45/mile pace in the center….didn’t feel ‘great’ on the run…bit stiff still, and legs not stretching out easily, so kept the intensity a bit lower, but smooth enough to be happy throughout

…and I did walk the steep sections of a few hills in the first 30 minutes of the run, so the overall run pace was actually faster than that…still babying that left hamstring…gets to feeling a bit stiff on those hills, so I’ve been staying conservative, but did pick up the pace on the track later in the run and all was good…I’m now doing faster running  _only_ on the track…flat…so I wonder when I’m going to be able to stop ‘worrying’ about the hamstring…the track stuff was fine…I _should_ be okay…my right knee was complaining lightly during and after the run, but eased up into the evening…ah the challenges.

And my long bike ride on Saturday looks under pressure with a bad weather forecast all day…sooo, I like so many of my Tri Buddies facing the same Saturday, may need to adjust that somewhere, or go indoors…although 3 hours on an indoor trainer presses the limits of mental endurance…but to shift it to another day, impacts the schedule down the line of other workouts, all delicately lined up to balance intensity, volume and enough rest to rebuild in between.

As I was rolling out the miles today, I was thinking that it’s sort of cool that I’m in good enough condition to do a Half Iron triathlon at any point on a whim…the 9.7 miles today could have easily been extended another 3.4 miles, and a 3 hour, 56 mile bike ride feels easy to me…and a bit of a 45 minute warmup swim, although inelegant, is certainly doable.

…first swim workshop of the year with Coach Dinah tomorrow (Friday)…report to follow

Of course by July 3rd, I’ll want to do more than just get through it

remaining intact…i be racing that one 🙂