Log #20: The Last American Post

Folks, I will be leaving for Europe in a few hours, so my next few posts might be written in French or Dutch, depending on which country I'm in when I run.

I'd like to start this post by saying that I have been REALLY stressed out the past 3 days, and it's definitely affected my sleep. Yesterday was a no-workout day, and then last night I was up until 12:30 packing and trying to calm myself down. It took forever to fall asleep, and when the alarm clock went off at 6:00am I thought long and hard about what to do next. I was exhausted, I hadn't slept well, my system is still recovering from the wedding... I basically felt like ass.

Whenever this happens, I know 2 things:

1. If I even TOUCH my bed again once I've gotten out of it to turn off my alarm clock, I will end up asleep in it. I've talked before about your mind conspiring against you to keep you from running, and it is never more persuasive than at 6:00am in the morning after you haven't slept.

2. Red Bull is my friend.

I Red Bull'd myself, got dressed, and jogged out to the track near my house. My legs felt stiff, I was still exhausted even with the sugary, caffeinated delicious Red Bull coursing through my veins. I got to the track and ran a mile at a nice slow pace. By the end of the mile I felt better, so I drank some water and began my run. Here's all I managed to pull off:

10 minute warmup
1600m @ 6:38
800m @ 3:20
400m @ 1:40
400m @ 1:25 (I decided to kick my ass for sucking so bad today)
10 minute cooldown

Now that I look at the workout, it's actually not too bad. My first mile actually felt pretty good, and I finished strong. The second mile was where my stamina failed, and I'd like to think it's a combination of sleep deprivation and wedding-related-shenannigans that caused it. When I run my speed workouts now, I've noticed that it feels a lot more natural to me. For the first 2 laps of the mile I completed, I was actually breathing 3 in / 3 out, which lets me know that I am definitely getting in better shape, I just didn't have the energy to keep up the pace today. I've been neglecting my body for the past few days, and it clearly has affected my workouts. Last week was a great running week, this one not so much.

I'll be running in kilometers until August 9... I'm REALLY pumped to try and get some runs in while I'm in Paris and Amsterdam. I'll be updating the blog from Europe. Au Revoir.