I'm Thinking: Too Much Too Soon

... sounds very "after-school special," doesn't it? It was my conclusion regarding today's run, though. Come with me ...

It all started like a pretty normal Monday. I'd mapped out a 10-mile run for the morning after having switched my long run day from Saturday to Monday to see if that would work better in our schedules. A switch of some kind was necessary and unavoidable now that it's darker longer in the morning which means I can't start a long run at 6 a.m. anymore. I have to wait until at least 7 a.m. I wasn't sure I wanted to cut into the weekend morning fun by about an hour, so I thought I'd try moving the long runs to weekdays when it really only affected my schedule.

I had my route in mind.

I got my grapes ready.

Thank you, Aldi, for still having yummy grapes at an affordable price!

I got my water bottle ready.

I love this thing. Check out how it straps on so I don't even have
to make an effort to hold it. Genious.

I disappointed Elly by not bringing her.

All of that tail wagging for nothing. sigh ...

I got to my start point, and I put my grapes in my shorty pants pocket. (I had to do this after getting out of the car so they wouldn't get squished by the seat belt ... it is a miracle I actually thought about this prior to buckling up ...)

The pocket is so shallow that it looked like
I had a growth on my hip. Who doesn't want
that? Not to mention, the pocket is on the same
side as I hold my water bottle ... who made
these pants?!

And, I took off! The first mile was slow going, but that's normal because I'm still warming up. The next 5 were pretty sweet, and I cruised along nicely. I even scored these:

I put my cash in my water bottle pocket, took a few steps and BAM! Hit the wall. Not just some random wall (although that would be a good story), the wall. The one you hit when you are just done. It came pretty much from out of nowhere, and there was no question about it. Every muscle in my body let me know that if they had their way, they'd all be on the couch. Being a couple of miles away from the car made that notion a bit difficult, though, didn't it ...

It turned out this happened right at the bottom of a hill (could not have timed it better myself!). So, up I walked, and I pondered what to do. I had the choice to cut two miles off the route and take a more direct way back to the car, or I could finish route between bouts of walking and running.

I got to my fork in the road, so to speak, and I took the path that would have me complete the 10 miles. It also took me past this so-very-awesome-would-have-missed-it-otherwise tree:

From a distance, there was little spectacular about this tree. From
underneath, however ... wow!

The path also took me past a store where I not only stopped to refill my water bottle but where I also stopped to see if they had any good Snoopy gel clings for our windows. They didn't have any I don't already have, so I moved on ... but good to know!

I walked the last mile of the route acknowledging that I was, indeed, done for the day. My brain, however, was on overdrive figuring out what happened. By and large, it's a case of too much too soon ... my goal back in September was to make 6-mile runs my weekly long run norm, and if that worked well, then push it to 8. I'm not sure where 10 came from other than I believe I thought, "Wow, 8 worked so well, why not 10?" Like it's just that simple. Between pushing too fast and dinking around with my running schedule, it's clear I need to go back to the basics, back to the schedule I've successfully used for three years, and back to some perspective about what I'm asking of myself. (Hey, Nancy ... ever heard the saying, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it?" Just wondering ...)

And, in coming to those conclusions in a way where I feel inspired and not defeated, I couldn't have asked for those last miles to be spent any better! Tomorrow is Rest Day! I think for the first time in a while, I'll be savoring that time off!