Sunday Runday

I attempted to take a picture at the 4 mile halfway point and it killed my run keeper. So I had to do two separate run tracker thingies, but here they are:

Part 1 - 4.18 miles
Part 2 - 3.86 miles

Total Distance: 8 miles (New distance!)
Total Time: 1:36:53
Total Elevation: 84 feet
Avg Pace: ~12 min/mile

What I ate: 3/4 of a Balance Bar, Starbucks VIA coffee + Chocolate milk (as I was out of regular coffee and regular milk; Ingenuity!), half a banana

So I wanted to try and fall asleep during the first mile, but no such luck this week. I opted to head south this time, following the trail of the WW1/2 to get intimately familiar with it. Now, of course on Friday, I had some issues with run keeper, but for the meantime, it appeared to be working this time.

I felt some tightness in my thighs in the first mile, so I stopped for a minute and stretched it out. Afterwards, no real pain, so hooray! After the first two miles, then we got into "new territory." At this point on Friday, I was starting to get all sorts of annoyed, so I didn't really have time to enjoy the scenery. Today was different, though, and I went along my merry way!

The last time I had been this far south on the Mt Vernon trail, I was on a bike, so all of the hills and valleys were great - use the speed from the valley to push me up the hill. Unfortunately, running has no wheels, so everything was manual :P But it was still nice - there are a lot of bridges and gorgeous vistas of the Potomac river.

Happily, I hit the four mile mark just outside of Fort Hunt Park, where I stopped to take pictures!

Sadly, that's when my Runkeeper died. Or rather, it showed my progress in all 0's, which scared the bejesus out of me. Silly Snickle, you should know that you can't expect your phone to do three things at once right now. It's delicate.

After screwing with it for a minute, I finally decided to give up and start a new run. On the way back, it didn't give me any audio cues, but I knew I had turned around at the halfway mark, so I was ok with it!

Around mile 5, I started to really wish I had brought NUUN or Gatorade or something other than water. I didn't drink any NUUN prior to my run, which in hindsight was a mistake. Although I think that I might just do a hybrid of Gatorade and NUUN as my hydration strategy - sorry, but those NUUNs still make me feel ill.

I stopped at the 6 mile mark water station and refilled and poured water over my head. Then I kept going!

So I felt like I hit "the wall" around mile 6.5 and 7 - just felt my energy go downhill fast. But I kept up my strategy of giving myself three "I want to quits" before quitting, and I am happy to report that I did NOT quit period. It's amazing what you can do if you allow yourself.

So the lessons learned from this run are as follows:

1. Drink NUUN/Gatorade before
2. Bring something to eat during the run if I'm doing over 7 miles. I saw on the WW1/2 course that they will be providing ACCEL Gels at the 7 mile mark. I might have to go invest in some so that I can make sure they work for me.
3. Bring Gatorade in one of my bottles - I need that extra something. Water is great, but isn't going to cut it. Especially if I've got a water stop on the way (which I do).

Overall, this week was full of technology malfunctions, and I did not run my 3-4 miles on Saturday. However, I'm learning more about what my body needs in order to complete this half marathon, and I am starting to feel more and more prepared.