It was another tough morning today but for completely different reasons. My hip flexor was still tight but greatly improved. I focused a lot of time the day before on foam rolling, deep stretching, using the heating pad and applying KT Tape to the area. By the time I woke up this morning it felt like a slightly overworked muscle but my mobility had mostly returned to normal.
What made it such a rough morning was a rogue mosquito that managed to find its way into the bedroom and decided to incessantly buzz my ear at 2:30 A.M. Every time I would start to fall back asleep the dang thing swooped in by my ear and woke me up. Eventually, I turned on the light so that when I would hear it I might be able to open my eyes, see it and smack it. No luck. Those damn things have a way of just disappearing right in front of your eyes.
I eventually turned off the light again and put my head entirely under the covers to get another hour of sleep. In all, I lost a little over an hour of sleep and I felt the loss at the start of my run. I honestly didn’t have high hopes for today’s workout.
Goal pace run
Thursday’s are marathon goal pace workouts. After a rough night’s sleep I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to keep my pace. Thankfully, my hip flexor never bothered me while on my run. I did make a point to foam roll and get a full dynamic warm up in, which certainly helped.
It turned out that my goal pace run went surprisingly well. Once I got going I settled into a good pace. I decided to try to reach the 6 miles within my immediate neighborhood today instead of branching out into the next neighborhood over. I was easily able to reach my goal mileage by zigzagging back and forth on the different streets. I only overlapped some streets slightly.
There is a man that walks in the neighborhood at the same early, dark hour. He’s even more lit up than I am, which is hard to believe because I look like a Christmas tree with a lighthouse beacon shining from my forehead. We must have been on a similar route because we passed each other no less than 5 times today. Sometimes going the same way and other times going in opposite directions. We waved the first couple of times and then pretty much stopped acknowledging each other. Hopefully, he didn’t think I was following him because it was always me coming up on him from one direction or another.
The best thing about today’s run, besides the fact that I had no pain in my feet or my hip flexor, is that at the end I not only hit my goal pace, I exceeded it by one tenth of a second. Ok, we’ll call that right on target.
My heart rate stayed in my aerobic and threshold zones and my cadence was an average of 181. I like my cadence to stay between 178 and 179, so this was a little high in my opinion. However, I think it may have come from a couple of times I picked up the pace to get past the walking light bulb or avoid cars driving by.
Fueling
I don’t normally fuel on mid-week runs but I had a conversation with a triathlete coworker recently and he suggested that I start working on training my gut to see what kind of fueling it can tolerate. Given that I also had a rough night’s sleep, I thought a little extra fuel during the run might be helpful. I used a Chocolate Huma gel with 1x’s caffeine at around the 40 minute mark of my run. I love this flavor! It tastes like chocolate cake icing to me. Whether I needed it or not, it was really yummy.
Following my workout I had yet another new nutrition product to look forward to. I recently purchased a bag of Skratch Vegan Chocolate Recovery drink mix and I planned to try it for the first time today. The only thing I normally fuel with following a mid-week run or workout is electrolytes and sometimes vegan BCAA’s. Then, I have breakfast about an hour or so after I get home.
In my research, I’ve learned that I should be taking in carbohydrates and protein within 30 minutes of my run or workout and to start hydrating immediately. I’m pretty good about hydration but I had not been getting in the other nutrients until much later. I’m interested to see how adding this recovery drink after harder or longer runs will impact my overall recovery and run the next morning. The good news though was that I liked the taste, so I’m more likely to continue using it.
Tomorrow is a welcomed rest day but an early morning meeting at work. Hoping I get a full night’s rest! I will need to bank some Z’s for my 11 mile long run on Saturday.
Workout
- 6 miles at marathon goal pace