Sunday morning bliss

20 in 2:20 @ 7:02. The only kind of math that makes me happy on a Sunday morning.

By my calculations, a 43 minute 10k tacked on at the end of that 20 mile run woulda had me my BQ. Did I have it in me to pull out that kind of 10k, 2 hours and 20 minutes into my run? Without a doubt. As it turns out, yesterday could've been the day. But then again, anything could happen in the last 10k so for now, all I can do is document that incredible training run in hopes of repeating, or better yet, improving on it when it really counts.

So like most great training runs that I've had, it started off seemingly ordinary. I mapped out a route that closely followed the first 20 miles of the marathon route to familiarize myself with how I should start off at an easy pace. The goal for the run was to average a 7:15/mi. or better and the plan was to run the first 10 at around 7:20/mi. then negative split the last half at 7:10/mi. or so. First mile in, I stayed at just under a 8:00/mi. and followed it up by a 7:17 for my second mile. So at the point, I felt pretty warmed up and thought, this feels like a good pace to settle into. The keyword there is feels good. I'm not sure what it was I did but for some reason that effort level felt comfortable with me so I sat on it and never bothered to check my pace except for when I got an update at each mile. As each mile ticked by, I consistently clocked in between 7:05-7:10 for the first 10 miles.

I should also mention that even though I had a late start at around 7:40am, the weather was relatively cool with generous amounts of tradewinds to keep my core temp in check which I'm finding is a big factor in keeping my heart rate and rate of perceived effort (RPE) down. Also, I traded in my usual run apparel and suited up in my tri gear to hold all my nutrition in my side pockets and to have the option of zipping down my top for ventilation when the heat rises. Anyway, I intentionally set the data fields to show only my current pace, distance, and time on my Garmin so I wouldn't get caught up in trying to "chase" after my average pace goal. The only time I checked my current avg. pace was right around mile 12 when it read 7:11/mi. so already, I was ahead of my goal and still had a lot left in the tank. So I think from then on, I made it a point to push it in the last 8 miles and see how I'd feel to run just under a 7:00/mi. pace. Sure enough, my body responded with a couple of low 6:50s which pretty much caused the adrenaline flood gate to swing right open.

Soon after I hit mile marker 17, I took it up another notch and pushed the last 3 miles around my 10k pace. And guess what? 6:42, 6:37, and an unbelievable 6:21 for my final mile of a 20-mile run. I think it goes without saying that I had a freakishly awesome run yesterday. I wouldn't necessarily say that I felt strong during the run, but I did feel comfortable and relaxed with the effort. I've been on the other side of the coin where I did feel strong (not fast) but definitely nowhere near as comfortable as yesterday. Again, I think the conditions had a lot to do with it. Yesterday's run definitely proved that I run much better under cooler conditions.

Anyway, I am by no means ready to hang up my shoes and call it a day. For all I know, it may have taken me all of the last 7 weeks to prep me for that single run so to bank on that experience as an indication of future runs would be careless. Even though I'm extremely happy that things are falling into place, I've still got 9 weeks to go and a helluva lot of work to do so I just need to keep things in perspective until then.