Stuff

I went home to the DC area last weekend and did my long run around a lake near my house. The weather was great, with temperatures in the low 60s. As recommended by Dr. Wright, I decided to try out those Cliff Shot thingies. I picked up three flavors, French Vanilla, Raspberry, and Chocolate. All of the flavors seemed to work and I felt good after eating them during my run, but Chocolate was the only flavor that didn't taste gross. On my run, I took a 15 second walk break every 5 minutes, and a 1 minute walk break every 45 min to down a Cliff Shot. I borrowed my dad's water belt, so I was able to drink some at whenever I wanted during my run. I think this really helped, but I'm looking forward to being able to have water handed to me every mile instead of having to carry the water myself. I've been behind on the running schedule, so I aimed for 18 miles at under 10 minute pace for my run.

I was able to complete my goal, but I was really hurting at the end. I made myself walk for a mile, stretched, and took an ice bath afterwords. The ice bath really made a difference, I would highly recommend them after long runs. If you don't have an ice machine, you still can get ice a couple of ways. First, you can just buy ice. Or, you can fill up 2 liter bottles of soda (which you get from a friend because runners don't drink soda) with water, put them in your freezer, and then cut off the plastic bottle and make use of the ice. Anyways, my knees really hurt the day after the run, which has never happened to me in five years of running. I was a little nervous about his so I decided to hold back on running until this Wednesday. Hopefully I can get through our last long run without any knee pain.