Training Log - Wednesday, August 4, 2010

So I decided to see how my calf and groin muscles would hold up today. I met Richard and James at Richard's house for a run up Monte Sano Mountain and back down again for a nice 10 mile out & back. We would have the opportunity to refill our water bottles and bladders at the ranger station inside the state park. "But why?", you wonder. Well, currently any running beyond a mile in Alabama requires that you continuously hydrate. I ended up drinking two bottles of Gatorade and about 1.5 liters of water in just 2 hours and a little under 10 miles. Yet, I still ended up feeling dehydrated after the run. The humidity and temperatures that have been prevalent in the South the last month are absolutely draining to any type of physical activity. Actually, jsut stnading outside for 5 minutes will cause you to be drenched. Thankfully, my legs held up for the entire run. While I was contantly feeling the pain, it was not overpowering nor did it get any worse during the run. I felt the groin muscle strain more going back downhill than I did going uphill. I'm not sure if that's normal or not, but that's how it felt. We kept a somewhat steady pace going up and down the mountain trails and I must say, I quite enjoyed it. I have been taking it rather easy the last couple of weeks and this workout felt great. Was is too hot? Yes. Too humid? Yes. But I figure, if I can handle this than I can handle any of the weather conditions about to be thrown at me at the remaining races for the year. Remember, I am only talking about the conditions, not about my ability to cover the terrain or distance of my upcoming races. I kept my heart rate fairly steadily at around 155 with spikes into the high 160s and low 170s when the climbs were steeper than usual. On these short 10 miles, we covered about 2700 feet of elevation change, not too bad for a short training run. I need to get another longer run in this week, but I'm not sure how to do that with this week's schedule. Maybe I can squeeze a long run in Friday morning.