Beautiful Day

I written alot about difficult runs and PB's recently.  Mostly because these types of runs are important, memorable, and recently very common for me.  Tonight I wanted to comment on another 'type' of run, the so called 'easy' run.  That's the training run where you feel like your floating and effort-wise it doesn't feel like a constant struggle.  I always see people writing about these runs - you'll see comments about 'runner's high' or endorphines, etc.  These types of runs to me are the product of hard work and really only come at certain points in your training cycle(s).  It's not mysterious that they 'just happen', they occur because what you are doing is working.

Don't get me wrong, these runs I truly enjoy and they are one of the many reasons why I run.  But I always get confused when I see comments about "I'm still searching for that runner's high..."  If you're searching for that run/feeling then search your log books - find out what you were doing the last time you had that feeling.  Do it again.  I promise you, you will have that feeling again.  Running is a science as much as it is physical and mental.  "But Bob I don't keep a log..." well then keep looking because your 'runner's high' runs will be few and far between.  This might sound harsh, but this is my blog and it's what I believe - so you'll have to put up with it. :)



Enough of my soap box though.  I got in a nice 3.7 mile easy run tonight (9:35 pace) that's about :10 - :15 seconds faster than my target pace tonight, but still within my target pace variance so I'm pleased with the effort put in tonight.  I started my second week in my 10k plan and Wednesday night I have my first interval training scheduled (8x400's) I'll be doing these at my 5k race pace (approx 9:04 pace) so we'll see how that goes.  I'm a little concerned though since we're supposed to get another wave of rainstorms starting tomorrow.  Hopefully it's not a bad as last week and won't effect my runnng plans too much.

I had a nice little phone conversation with my oldest son tonight - he's 15 now and earlier this school year he promised he and his mother (my ex) that he was going to try out for the track team.  I found out that he was planning on flaking on this promise so I called him on it tonight. I actually got to use the phrase: "Cowboy Up."  I've been waiting a while to use that and I think it had a positive affect.  I told him that I on't expect him to become this great runner, but I do expect him to follow through on a promise and to put in the hard work (mileage) to find out what kind of man he's going to be.  And that maybe, just maybe he'll learn something about himself in the process.  He's going to be suprised though - two years ago without any training he clocked a 6:13 mile, and that was on the road.  The kid is fast I just think he's afraid to fail. It will be interesting to see how he responds to our talk.  I'll know by Wednesday if he signed up for the team....

Keep Steppin'
Bob