May 2009 mileage

I ended this month with a 6.33-mile run around Town Lake in Austin. I
did a one-mile warm up, was feeling good and then did three miles in
7:03, 7:03 and 7:07. I know it's not a good idea to run this hard one
day after a 14-miler, but I felt pretty good. Still, by Mile 4, I was
ready to ease up a little and make the rest of the run an easy one
like I had planned to in the first place.

Lo and behold, as I am nearing the Run-Tex water stop under the First
Street bridge, I run into Karen, a running friend of mine from Fort
Worth who was in Austin to be a with a friend who was about to to have
a baby. Karen was running with two other guys from Run-Tex who were
nearing the end of their long runs. They were doing a form of Gallo-
walking: running four minutes, walking one. I've never trained that
way, but I was a little tired and decided to run with them and was
glad when the one-minute walk breaks came.

Anywhoooo...

Here are the monthly running stats

Total mileage: 180.7
Time: 23 hours, 59 minutes, 52 seconds (Had no idea I was 8 seconds
from running an entire day for the month)
Pace: 7:58

May 2008 running: 128.94 miles in an 8:39 pace

May 2007 running: 81.32 miles in 9:13 pace

Total miles in 2009: 846.29
Time: 4 days, 16 hours, 46 minutes, 7 seconds
Pace: 7:59

May running totals

I ran the last five days of May, including today's 10-miler, and ended up with a 128.97-mile month, my highest mileage total of the year.

Conditions today, even though I was out on the trail by 7:30 am, were brutal. 75 degrees, 70 percent humidity. The sun was real up close and personal.

And yet, I decided to do a route that had some hills, albeit most were in the beginning of the run. So, I eeked out 10 miles in 1:25:53. An 8:35 pace. Heart rate averaged about 82 percent max, though it hovered around 86 percent the last two miles.

I had water at a fountain about 3.5 miles in, then I had more water at the ice cooler in my car at mile 7. At the end, I was feeling pretty good about myself. Then, I saw a guy with an El Scorcho t-shirt on. That's the 25k race I'm going to run at midnight on July 20.

I asked if the guy had run the race before, he said yes. Then I asked him _ he said his name was Derrick _ I asked him what his run was this morning. "22 miles," he said.

22 miles! 22 miles! That's crazy. Crazy. Crazy. He was just finishing his run. He said he'd been out since oh, 5:30 am.

I couldn't have run another 3 miles this morning, and this guy _ Derrick, or was it Derek _ ran 22. Before I started feeling too bad, Derrick said he recognized me from reading my blog.

"Pretty cool," I thought to myself.

Anyway, here are my running totals for the month.

Runs: 21
Miles: 128.97
Time: 18 hours, 35 minutes, 52 seconds
Pace: 8 minutes, 39 seconds-per-mile
Best pace: 6:54 at the Mayfest 5K run on May 3.
Avg hr: 80.5 percent


Miles in 2008: 536.83
Time: 3 days, 7 hours, 15 minutes, 39 seconds
Pace: 8 minutes, 51 seconds-per-mile