Snakes and Turtles

with work and trying to shoot my bow as much as possible i have not been running nearly as much lately. i have a goal of 400 miles for this year. i think i have ran about 215 so far. this week is gonna be an easy one since i leave for colorado on friday and want my legs to be as fresh as possible on the trip. luckily i have been able to shoot my bow quite a bit recently and have pretty good confidence again.

i ran 10 miles yesterday. it was a little hot (85) and very sunny when i headed out, as i have mentioned before, the sun shining bright always makes me so tired. i headed out at 6:45 pm. about mile 5.5 the sun started going down, and i got a huge second wind. i felt so much better running after the sun went down, i felt like i had only ran a mile or two, instead of 6. the second half of the 10 miles was only 4 minutes slower than the first half, usually i slow down much more than that. i actually had to slow myself down on the last 2 miles. i was feeling so good, but knew the end would be painful if i kept up the current pace. after mile 2 my 1/2 miles ranged from 5:53 to 6:18. one 1/2 mile was 6:18, 4 were at 6:00, 3 at 6:04, 3 at 6:07, 3 at 6:11, and 2 at 5:53 (these were mile 2.5 and mile 10). my overall pace was 11:52, and i had a pretty steady pace for the entire run. my average heart rate was 166, my max heart rate was 169, pretty stable too. came 1/2 a step from stepping on another snake, just as it was getting dark, then the traffic started up on the road with no shoulder and high weeds. i hate snakes.

i have to throw out props to jeff who is killing mile after mile.

on another note, since i haven't been running as much my strength training and yoga hasn't been getting done either. after my hunting trip i have to get back to running pretty hard to get back on track for the st jude's marathon.

thought of the day: "the turtle only makes progress when he sticks his head out." (author escapes me right now) otherwise he is just sitting in his shell, in his comfort zone, not really in danger, but not gaining anything either. have you ever seen a turtle on the road, when the first car passes, the turtle just shuts up in his shell and basically waits for a car to hit him. his only hope is for the next drivers to spot him in time and swerve to miss him. he is leaving his entire existence up to the responsibility of the drivers. i don't see many turtles on the roads where i run, based on the drivers, i would say the turtles were wiped out years ago.