Week 5: Six and a half miles

20:40 sec run/walk ratio
1:47:19 hours
6.94 miles
15.5 minutes/mile

I didn't run last weekend, or do my midweek runs this week, because I'd hurt my back on Friday and was feeling really stressed and besides, I really needed to get some firewood in before the rain and snow that was forecast for Monday, so I spent my time cutting firewood instead. This week, again, I need more wood and it's supposed to rain (or snow, the weather report can't make up its mind) on Sunday, so I was worrying about having time to get some wood in and do a long run today, and finally, I decided that I don't really need to train up for a full marathon, especially not when I've got other stuff I need to do on weekends, so I redid my schedule for the half marathon and ended up with a 6.5 mile run for this weekend—something I could finish before noon and still have time/energy for some woodcutting this afternoon.

The run went well. I got to the park around 9:45 AM and finished around 11:30 AM. It was cold, but not terribly so, around 60 F and sunny but with a cold breeze. I wore my full-length leggings, long-sleeved running shirt, and jacket for the first two miles, but took off the jacket for the rest of the run, and it was just about right. I wore my visor instead of my cap because I thought I'd still want some air for the top of my head, and that was about right, too. So I was comfortable for the whole run, not too hot and not too cold.

I had a protein drink before my run, which kept me going throughout the run. I brought a GU with me, but didn't use it.

I wasn't pushing but still kept up a good pace. I thought, after I'd started, that as long as I'm going to be just doing a half marathon schedule, I should try bumping up  my run/walk interval to 30:45 seconds and see how that goes. Too late for this run but I'll set my app for next run.

It's hard to make myself get out there when it's cold. Once I get going, I'm fine, and it's better running in cool weather than hot, but it's a psychological thing I'm going to have to overcome if I'm going to keep training all winter.

I decided to try doing a tonglen meditation for the victims of the recent terrorist attacks while I was running. I usually try to visualize the suffering of others that I breathe in as sort of like smog: dark, dirty, full of scratchy, wiry shards of junk. Then the compassion I breathe out is warm, soft, golden light, like sunlight. But it was taking too long to conjure up and set my visualizations while I was running, so I ended up just chanting "hate" on the in-breath and "love" on the out-breath, which worked pretty well. Possibly not a proper tonglen—I'm not Tibetan Buddhist, anyway, so it's not usually part of my practice, but I like to use it on occasions like these.