3.5 Mile Run

Well, the snow didn't come...yet. It looks like we got somewhat lucky. The storm veered off the ciast and missed us. But they say it is wrapping back around and will end up hitting us tonight and tomorrow, dumping 3-6" on us by end of day tomorrow. Not that bad considering what we got recently, and what we could have gotten today. But the high, hurricane-force winds are still a real threat. And boy were they gusting already today!

So, I got home from work today and decided to try and get my run in with the little daylight I had left. The schedule called for 3.5 miles today. I hit the roads and knew right away it was going to be a tough run. the wind was blowing hard. It made running difficult at times as it was like a wall you had to run through. It sucked. It was also very cold, cutting through you like a knife and making my eyes water. Miserable!

Due to that my mindset changed right away. I said to myself, "I'm going to go slow. Just get through the run and don't worry about your time/pace.". So I decided not to look at my time on the watch. i covered it with my sleeve and didn't look at it- I just ran. When I started getting close to the distance (roughly) I thought I needed, I snuck a peek at the bottom of my Garmin to verify mileage- not looking at time. When I finally finished, I figured my time was going to be pretty bad- rough weatherand all. to my surprise, it was the fastest time for me at 3.5 miles yet. I did it in almost 36 minutes flat. When I did 3.5 miles before, the best I did was just over 37. I was amazed because my pace didn't seem near as fast as that one, yet my time was better- and that was with running into the wind a lot (espeically on a lot of the uphills-sucked!). So, I guess I'm getting a little faster. I still don't really care about my times right now, but it's always fun to see the little incremental improvements along the way!