My hair is on fire!

Due to scheduling conflicts my running partner and I couldn't hook up for our long run this weekend. I drove to a greenway / trail area Saturday morning for a traffic free run. Well, traffic free as far as motorized vehicles go. There were plenty of other runners, walkers and a few cyclists. Why do some walkers think that on a recreation path they still have to walk on the left?

My goal according to the FIRST training plan was 20 miles at 7:41. I initially had trouble keeping a pace that was there or just under. After eight-plus miles I was averaging 7:26. A quick Gu/water stop, another 6ish, and more gu & water. Same pace, but feeling tired. Mile 18 hit and I started up another trail spur that was gradually uphill. I had run this earlier around mile 3 but didn't notice how uphill it was. I went out 1.5 miles and turned around. At mile 20, my pace had slowed enough to drop the overall average to 7:27. Not a big deal, but 7:26 is my BQ pace. I have some sort of mental hang-up about it lately. I was still about 1 mile away from the car. And it was mostly downhill. Boom - 7:04 final mile and overall back down to 7:26!

The next day my partner had done his 20 miler and texted that he did a 7:50 pace, "not like my hair was on fire." To which I replied, "Note to self: take matches to race, light Tim's hair on fire."

And speaking of races, we decided about this local 15k on Saturday that I have been trying to figure out how to fit into a weekend that calls for one more 20 mile run. Tim and I discussed and are going to run it twice. The race starts at 7:45am. We're going to start at 6am and pre-run the course, but not like our hair is on fire. It will be a good way to see how well we can run on well-warmed-up (aka tired) legs.