Unintentional mileage and a great Sunday!

My 3' tall, 32lb alarm clock woke me up this morning. It was raining outside and I wanted to roll over and sleep more, but it wasn't to be. It was for the best, since Mendy was helping out at church for the first service and I could join her, instead of both of us sitting through separate services. Delicious coffee drink (24oz coffee w/ 4 shots of espresso) and my trusty Nalgene bottle full of water, and we are off. Light rain was making exercise look like a personal challenge instead of any kind of "fun". By the end of church, though, it was clearing up and looking nice.


We ate at P.F. Changs for lunch. Hmmm, what to have...what to have... Oooh, spicy chicken! (voice in back of head: uh, aren't you planning on running? Bad move, David). I wonder how spicy it is? Eh, I'll try it anyway. (voice in back of head: uh oh...) Mendy and I shared a chicken lettuce wrap that Robin recommended when we ate there with them a few months back. Then the spicy chicken came, with roasted hot peppers mixed in (little voice: Dude, do NOT eat those!) Ah, just a few can't hurt. Whew, this is spicy! (little voice: I'm telling you...) Um, wow, those peppers are hot even if very tasty. Maybe they won't affect my run, though. (little voice: jackass)

Grace fell asleep on the way home and continued her nap for a couple of hours. I suited up in my running duds and tried to flush some of the peppers through, get some last minute hydration, and a gel for fuel. Oh, quick thought: a piece of gum to chew to avoid cotton mouth. This wound up being pretty key. I run by feel, mostly: I generally don't rigidly plan a route or distance, just see where the road, how I feel, and my pace take me. I set out thinking about 6-8 miles, and had some idea where I wanted to go. The peppers kicked in almost immediately, and my pace was limited to about 8-ish/mile. I decided to shoot for the upper range of my "plan" and set my focus. Wound up going a bit far, though:

12 miles in 1:37:52 @ 8:10/mile



Would have liked a better pace, and probably could have pushed it to near 7:30 if I had some hydration, a gel, and no hot peppers with me. It's the longest I've ever ran at one time, but my base of endurance is high from the cycling and swimming I've been doing. I did ice my shins and knees when I returned, though. I also drank a liter of Gatorade like a freshman at a kegger.
I estimate roughly 8lbs lost in fluid weight, which still concerns me. Hmmm... At least Garmin reports over 1700 calories burned!

Other than that, we washed the car, ate a huge salad (I wanted pizza), and hung out. I'm pretty beat right now, honestly. Swim tomorrow, fast bike ride Tuesday, and a run on Wed, then I'm gonna taper for the Oly tri next Sunday. Work tomorrow! Yay!

bleh