Two Fives

I am trying hard to wrap my head around two facts that are having a serious effect on my being right now:

1) It appears my child is not a good sleeper; therefore, I am not a good sleeper :-)

and...

2) This spring has been wet and cool, which means it is pretty dreary out there. I am also gearing up for a wet and cool summer. I tend to not do well with days on end of dreary weather, but I really need to get over this one and move on!


Yesterday morning, I snuck out for a run around 6:45am. Sam had been up early, so I went downstairs with her, and we had breakfast and played for a bit before I called up the stairs for Ryan to come down and take over. I didn't really want to run (see items #1 and #2 above). But I hadn't managed to get in my run on Monday, so I "needed" to get out if I wanted to get my miles in for the week. In the hopes that a bit of time running through the mud and stomping through a few puddles would help, I decided to run the 5 mile Homeplace loop. And despite the constant mist, my tiredness, and the fact that I was wearing tights because it was only 43 degrees, I did enjoy the run while I was out there. On these overcast days, the brilliant greens of the leaves of the false lily of the valley on the forest floor, the emerging purple of the lilacs and swamp azaelea, and the whites of the wood anemone and the flowering bushes just jump out at me as I run by. The yellow backs of the two male goldfinch that chased each other across my path seemed all the more brilliant. There is a certain beauty in these grey days. I just have to try to focus on that, and not the fact that I would like some sunshine, please :-)

I went to bed super early last night, and woke up feeling a bit more rested this morning. After I dropped Sam off at daycare, I came home, quickly got ready and headed out for another 5 mile run. The Highland Green loop this time, as my training plan for the day says "5 pace," and I figured this would be the best place to do a run of this sort. Now, what pace is another story :-) I looked at the MacMillan calculator, plugging in both 3:44 (MDI 2008) and 3:30 (the time that I would like to run at some point) for a marathon, and also 1:43:22 for a half marathon, which is what I ran long ago at the Maine Half Marathon, back in 1998 before Ryan and I were married. The paces for workouts varied, of course, depending on what numbers I plugged in, but using my old half marathon time, the calculator says my steady state runs should be run between 7:54 and 8:07. I feel I should be able to run faster than 1:43:22, but it seems best to base things off some sort of concrete number, so there you go :-) In any event, although I was not quite as tired this morning, it was still dreary out, and a light mist was falling as I ran, making me feel like I'd rather turn around and go curl up on the couch with my book than run. So I didn't really commit to the idea of a "pace" run until I saw the numbers on the Garmin at 2 miles, and realized I was running around 8:15 pace. I figured if I pushed things a bit, I might actually be able to hit between 7:54 and 8:07. Obviously, my splits weren't anything close to even, but when I hit the stop button at 5.0 miles, my average pace was 8:06. Cool. Now, what all this means, who the heck knows? :-)