Writing and I.

I have so many thoughts fighting for attention during the start of every run - especially the first 5 or so miles, before I get too tired to think. Anyway, I was pondering over my writing, something I am "supposed" to be good at, given the fact that I have 8 or so years of non-stop practice.

I have noticed that over the last year, I have lost the concise style that I so enjoy, and I have replaced it with this obtuse over-the-top tone that causes such verbal indigestion as to leave one with a gallstone. Why is it so difficult to form clear concise sentences that express complicated ideas??? I notice that when I try to express complicated ideas, the meaning gets distorted so much so, that the sentence loses its point and becomes a long sentence about nothing.

Hmmmmm...maybe I am just obtuse!?

Anyway, an easy 7 miles this am. It is so tempting to go long everyday - but I have been holding myself back yesterday and today. This is because since I hate taking days off, I realise my body needs a break - 7 miles is enough of a "break" in my book. My PF has also been acting up - I have been rolling my feet on a golf ball for atleast 15 minutes a day - this helps stretch out the muscle.

One Fine Day

One fine day, we open our eyes and let the sun shine in. The light exposes the beauty in nature, but also the darkness of our soul. The soul envies nature, and this, to my mind, is the eternal sin of humankind. We are trapped inside our weaknesses.

If we cannot be honest with ourselves, how can we be honest with other people?

One day, we will be haunted not by other people, but by our own soul.

7.5 easy recovery
32 warm laps in the pool.

Thursday morning big miles.

I have been craving a long run for a few days now. It was so very hot this morning - about 29 degrees in the middle of the night with 80% humidity.

I was in the zone right from get go and surprisingly had one of the strongest long runs - finished 22 miles in less than 2:50 minutes. Last 4 miles @ 28.25 minutes. It felt damn fast and I felt no soreness or discomfort. One of the nicest moments in any long run is an unexpected breeze - I only caught one at about mile 14.

Have a great day! I'm off to eat!

Stair climbing

I had one of the more challenging mornings in a while a few hours ago. I woke up knowing that I wanted to tune out for a few hours, but was also aware that my legs were going to take ages to warm up. I did the next best thing. I shut all the windows in the stairwell and did one of my favorite workouts : stair sprints!! These were no ordinary stair sprints - I have taken to skipping 3 stairs at a time to increase leg strength. I am not quite sure how stair climbing helps. I do however know that Singapore is flat as a pancake and running long on flat pavement gets boring very quickly. Today was an excellent opportunity to just let the mind switch off and repetitive movement is almost like meditation - the mind goes quiet, and one is left alone - totally!

I was dripping within 5 minutes. I have always believed that sweat cleanses you from places that water cannot reach. When you increase leg strength, you increase the amount of capillaries, and in my experience, blood is transferred to your muscles at a faster rate. Whatever it is, stairs have definately helped my legs fatigue much more slowly. How else would you explain the fact that I can run 12 miles quite comfortably after a session of sprints?!

The human body is capable of so much more than we give it credit for. I prove it to myself day after day. I am not a natural athlete by any means - but I make no excuses - not getting out there, even if its for 20 minutes, is just not an option. Once you make up your mind that quitting is out of the question - you have no choice but to do it. So get out there and run already!

400 double stair sprints 83 minutes
9.4 miles even splits ( I did however finish faster than I started - my first mile was 8min/mile, I finished at 7:40min/mile)

A glorious morning. Thank you!

Trade sweat for strength, trade doubt for belief, trade fear for courage.

I am a runner.

I will run in the heat of the afternoon today - I'm looking forward to being out around the hottest time of the day with the lowest shade cover and just sprinting up a flight of stairs for an hour or hour and a half. We will see. (Edit: I managed just over 40 minutes before being bored.)

This morning I had an "omigosh I'm a runner moment":

I go days at a time without washing my hair "because im running in the morning anyway". (I think its pushing it now - its been 4 days)

I engage in polite conversations with people but really thinking about about my time splits.

I love the amounts I can put away - I may look like a dainty Asian woman but I wouldnt trade my appetite for anything :-)

All talked out. Return to regular ponderings in 14-ish hours :-)

Suicides

For everynight of decent sleep, I follow it up with 4 nights of crap. Just too much adrenaline. Oh well, after another night of ridiculousness, I couldnt wait to be started.

I had it in my head that I wanted something hard and fast - the only problem with this is that its just too hot and it takes several hours to get my heart rate down after a morning session. I wanted to be sore today - running never hurts, but I still wanted to see how much it took for the lactate to build up.

200/400 stair sprints skipping 3 steps at a time - excellent for quad strength 40 mins
8 mile intervals as follows:
1.5 mile warm up
3 miles @ 20.30 (20 secs or so off 5k pace)
0.5 mile cool off
1.5 mile tempo @ 7min/mile
1 mile suicides (this is basically a workout that should be ideally done on a track - u do short 10 second repeats till failure where you all but cough up a lung)
0.5 slow slow jog.

I feel great! The only thing is - workouts like this mess with my appetite. I am never hungry during the day and ravenous during the night. I have taken to eating a tub of ice cream as recovery. It isnt actually so bad - its cold, provides calcium, and...oh well....

I still dont feel like I pushed hard enough - I had gas in the tank - will try this workout in a few days over the weekend and see where it takes me.

Pain

Here are some pavement ponderings on pain from this morning - "excruciating pain is not enough to break those who are willing to die".

For me, racing is not about overcoming pain. It's about as running fast as I can. The pain is just the way the body speaks to you, a side phenomenon. It's silly to try to overcome it or attack it. We talk about the "pain" of running as if it were a single phenomenon. Actually, in running as in life there are many different sorts of pains, and one can learn to distinguish these pains in order to respond to them differently. It is very rare that generating the sensation of "pushing through it" is the appropriate response to pain. My sense is that generating that feeling is just layering one type of pain on another.

I didnt run yesterday. In fact, I was in bed from 6pm to 4am straight, drifting in and out of sleep. My legs were ready to go this morning - however, I was plagued by side stitches which I attribute to dehydration and very hot weather. The run was punctuated by a number of walk breaks - each lasting no more than 5-10 seconds though. This is what was on tap this am.

12.25 miles
26 laps in extremely warm water. What is up with this heat?!

I might try and get in a couple more this pm. Depends if my neighbour is up for a walk :-)