10K Blowout *(^&*%^(%*^&

Every now and again you just know its not the day to be running , well today was one of those days. As is usual I did walke away learning a few things, here is what I know!

New Rule #1 .... DO NOT , I REALY MEAN >>> DO NOT have a massive steak dinner and then try to run the next morning ! This isn't the first time I have been suspicious that a big steak the night before is slowing me down but now I know this for a fact ! back in July I did a 10K and had some disappointing results, I expected to break the 45 min mark and came in closer to 48 minutes , the whole race felt like it was uphill ! The meal the night before the race was a big Steak!

I started out wanting to do a 16K run today , the route I take I can abort the longer run at the 4.5K mark and turn it into a 10K and that's exactly what I did. I felt very sluggish and a cramp. I even walked up one of my last big hills . Ended up with a whopping 1:02:53 , real slow for me. I didn't really get into the run until about the 8K mark ! Things started to come together at that time and I could have kept going but called it a day !

Before I set out today I had a large OJ, 2 Cups of Coffee and an English Muffin with Peanut Butter. Tuesday when I did a new PB for the 16K I has OJ, Coffee and a couple of Cinnamon buns !

On an upside I did wear my Heart Rate Monitor today . Learned that I am doing 150 bpm when I am at a comfortable , sustainable stride ... about 11.0-11.5 Kmh. I was suprised when I hit the hills and the rate climbed close to my MAX ! Regardless of my age of 46 years my Max rate is is around 175 bpm , so running at 150 bpm puts me in the 85% of max . Now this is a wee bit high , I probably should run more around 140 bpm or 80% of my Max . When I got above 160 bpm I notice that I was stressed , falling behind in o2 and generally felt tired ! One thing I didn't like about the HRM was the tightness of the strap around my chest.

I have a light dinner tonight , tomorrow I will have a cup of coffee and now food then hit the trail!

Ron.