Some Things Never Change

Saturday morning Holly and I headed out for our 20 mile training run at 6:30 a.m. (you can read all about that run on Holly's blog HERE, if you feel so inclined).  If you don't want to read about it, here are a few pictures of the run...we wonder why it takes us so long to do our long runs :)

I felt like climbing a branch, it was fun. 

I'm not sure what I'm doing here. 

As soon as my Garmin showed 20 miles I fell to the ground, it was quite dramatic.

Okay, enough pictures let's get to it.

I walked out and what to my wondering eye should appear but the lightness of day was finally here.  Do you like my song?!?  Anyways, it was 6:30 in the a.m. and it wasn't pitch black.  YAY!!!  Holly and I were both so excited because that meant that we could finally start doing our weekday runs OUTSIDE!!  Hallefreakinlujah, we have been trapped in the "cave of wonders" for far too long.

So this morning, after getting shredded, we suited up and headed out.  It was glorious!!!  We saw our friend, who we've never actually talked to, "peace out guy."  We got to see the beautiful temple which is always a wonderful sight.  And we got to see Mama Jex, she was right on cue.  I'm sure the people driving near Mama thought I was a complete idiot waving as big as I possibly could with my huge, white, Mickey Mouse gloves on.

It's nice to know that even after months of not running about the city, we were able to see some familiar faces and a few of our favorite things.  We did an 8.25 mile loop and it was just wonderful.  

For those times that you might be stuck on a treadmill though, here is an easy to remember hill workout to try.  Warm up for 2 miles then do 7, .25 mile hill repeats with .50 mile recovery.  I put my speed at 7.5 mph (I don't claim to be a fast or a slow runner, just an average gal who enjoys to run) and the incline at 7.5%, run a quarter of a mile then lower it to 0% and recover for a half mile.  Repeat 7 times.  I can't tell you how much it bothered my OCD little brain to be doing 7.5's on everything but only repeating it 7 times.  I couldn't figure out which would be worse though, doing a half of a repeat or stopping at 7...it bugged me the whole run.  I finished up with 8 miles, I was dead...I was beat...I was deadbeat...I was a deadbeat.  There are few things better than kicking your own butt during a workout!

That's all!