I had a lovely 14 mile run today on trails I don't know well. It was like I was exploring! Thankfully the trails were well marked and the weather was beautiful. With this heart rate training I don't really get tired so much as it just takes for freaking ever to get my long runs in! Today was my longest heart rate training yet. My times seem to be improving a bit, but realistically... new trail... unknown elevation... longer miles.... who knows how long this is going to take me?
I'm not kidding. I can't make plans on long run day anymore because I feel like I literally could be running for 300 hours at a time. But, I had nowhere to be and started as early as possible. Early because I LOVE to watch the sunrise and early because my lord I need all the time I can get. Not even two miles into the run I'm stopping to take pictures (that will never show how pretty it actually was), and I say to myself, "Erin you need to stop messing around if you want to get this run done before sunset". Hmpf... good point.
And I was off. Just so ya know, my current running often leads to this song playing in my head
You know, just kind of chugging along. Looking at the scenery, going nowhere fast.... What a wonderful soundtrack! Well, minus the crash at the end that is.
Seven miles out and seven miles back seemed like no sweat when I looked at it on paper. Yeah, they always seem easy on paper don't they? Just seven miles! I run seven miles in my sleep! Welp, it wasn't as easy as the paper led me to believe. Shocking I know. Because I am constantly looking at my Garmin to find my heart rate I am constantly seeing how SLOWLY the miles are going by. Ai yi yi. I started making deals with myself... I won't look until my alarm goes off. Well that doesn't work! My alarm is going off all the time!
Eventually I came to accept the fact that if I wanted a 14 mile run I was just going to have to let it happen the way it needs to. Which means slowly. I was finally able to turn around. YEAH. And the first mile after the turn around flew by. I thought man this is magic beans I'm living the dream! The other 6 miles were a mix of living the dream and wishing the dream was a little better.
But I got lots of thinking, saw 5 deer and only two humans. A whole morning with only two humans and I was wearing a short sleeve shirt by the end! If you can't be happy about a run like that... then maybe you need to rethink your happy.
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