Biggest Training Bonk Ever

Yep. I had a fun run on Saturday. And I made 3 "Rookie Mistakes." Here's what you need to know:

Pharmie left for an Evotri training camp early on Thursday morning. I had Henry Thursday night all by myself (our first night with just Dad and son EVER), and Pharmie's Mom came up over the weekend. Pharmie got back into town on Sunday morning, and Henry survived 3+ days with me (and Grandma)! Grandma even brought goodies for me when she came up:

Saturday, Grandma took Henry to the Zoo:

I was STARVING when they left in the morning, so I INHALED lunch. Rookie Mistake #1: My eyes were bigger than my stomach. As I "let my food settle," I ran some branches to the compost site:

(I tweeted this photo along with this text: "A little used phrase: 'To the compost site, bitches!'")

Less than 2 hours after eating, I KNEW I needed to get out on my long run before Grandma and Henry got back. Rookie Mistake #2: So I took off on my run thinking "oh, my full stomach will settle with these first few miles." Oh, also, it was 12:30. Rookie Mistake #3: Go out for a run during the heat of the day on a warm afternoon.

I headed out on a route that would put me around 13.5 miles. I was going to run the first 5+ moderate, and then descend the next 6 miles (cooling-down for the final 2 miles). The warm up was fine. The first mile of the build was good (6:23 - a solid place to start my descend).

Miles 2 and 3 of the descend were fine as well: 6:31 and 6:19. But I felt like barfing. That food did NOT settle. I felt horrible. And it was hot.

I ran a bit more of the next hard mile (descend mile #4; overall mile #9), and then I suddenly found myself stopping to walk. I don't do that much... I hate it when I do that. I walked for a minute and ran again. I got past the next mile marker and ran to some water. I drank. And I drank. And I drank.

I started off running hard again, but I was so full of food / water / disappointment that I had to stop and walk again. I NEARLY turned around to head straight across a bridge towards home (cutting the 13.5 mile route to under 10), but I realized THIS was the time that I had to do this long run - Grandma had Henry, and I needed to use this time! (Which was another reason I felt so bad for timing the run so poorly - it was my chance for a solid stroller-free run, and I was blowing it!) None of my injuries were hurting, so I figured it'd be fine to go on with the regularly scheduled 13.5 miles and push through this bonk.

I eased up the effort, but didn't go REALLY easy. I stopped to walk a few more times. I ended my final 3 miles in 6:45, 7:01, and 8:40 (which included a bit of walking up a hill in that final mile). The bad news is that I finished 13.5 miles in 1:38 - usually I'm doing workouts like that in around 1:30. And my hard 6 miles turned into only a hard 3.5 miles. The good news is that I still got in 13.5 miles. And (as I tweeted) there are some people that would kill for 1:38 over a long half marathon.

I collapsed on the floor at home. Grandma and Henry were still off having fun. Kermit came over and started licking the sweat off my chest:

(That whole red area is from Kermit's tongue.)

I hadn't had one in a long time, but I wanted an ice bath. First, I was HOT, and it would help cool me down. Second, my legs were getting pretty sore, so the cold water might make them feel better. (I didn't feel like my legs really worked that hard on this botched run, but with the work they DID do along with the heat, they were fried.) So I ran just cold water into the tub, dumped in out entire ice bucket, and slowly lowered my man-parts into the freezing water:

That night, after getting Henry to bed, I was winding-down in bed with my laptop. I used my laptop to snap a photo of my RED SHOULDERS from the hot shirt-less run earlier in the day:

It's kinda hard to tell, but I'm FRIED! Oops.

But the next day, Pharmie got home, and we all enjoyed a quick easy run to Menards!

Henry's first real run in the stroller withOUT the carseat!

Maybe an easy run in a day or 2, then some speed work, and then another long run this weekend (this time WITH Henry because Pharmie has to work). The "Get In Gear 10K" is now less than 2 weeks away!!

p.s. I also went to cheer at "Goldy's Run 10 Mile" early Saturday morning. I took a lot of photos around mile 4. Click here to see my slideshow of photos.