Today I wanted to fit in 10 miles before work which meant running the majority of my miles in the darkness.
But there was no other time to fit in this run today (10 hour work day + dinner with friends after work) so I just went out there and did the run - obviously avoiding the scary street.
As I ran my 2.5 mile warm up, I kept seeing shadows and thinking it was a person but this time it turned out to be a mailbox, garbage cans and a flag. I kept telling myself to relax and not think about someone lurking in the darkness because there was no one there.
When I reached the street I was going to do my intervals, I went right into it. There is this really nice 0.8 mile loop neighborhood track near me that is fairly flat with super low traffic. On the first few loops, I kept doing a double take on a garbage can I thought was a person. It was just the shadows playing games with my eyes.
As I made it through my third and fourth intervals, the stars had begun to fade and I could see a slight hue of red on the horizon where the sun was eventually going to peak over. The darkness that I had started in was slowly turning into daylight. The neighborhood remained quiet through my whole workout and I never saw anyone else out and about.
Thursday workout -
6x1200m @ tempo pace w/ 1 min recovery
I am glad I didn't let the incident Tuesday scare me away from morning running. One thing that makes running so enjoyable to me is running before most people are awake. The quiet and peacefulness of the mornings is my favorite way to start the day. If anything, Tuesday was a reminder to me that I need to stay safe and continue to be alert.
The street intervals weren't too long in distance but I turned this workout into a medium long run to get in the extra miles. This is my last big week before starting to decrease miles for the half marathon race. I have enjoyed the training but I am ready for some lighter mileage weeks. Almost end of the week medium long run was a success. Feels pretty good to knock out a bunch of miles before even my husband is awake. He is so not a morning person.
Running all these miles before work meant that I was a little bit late to work (thankfully my work is flexible). I am so glad that I have tomorrow off and that I have a four day weekend (for Labor Day). I am not sure how much rest and relaxation I will get because the weekend is packed with some fun activities :-)
Happy Thursday and Have a great weekend!
8 comments:
That's a seriousrun to tackle before work. Glad you were able to shake off the "spooks". I have a 10 miler planned for 5am tomorrow... hopefully there won't be any "incidents"!
Enjoy the extra long weekend!
This makes me really miss my morning runs! Beautiful photo.
I love early runs but I'm a whimp too so I don't usually do them. For some reason, running in the dark seems easier to me. Weird right? Like the time goes so fast. FYI, my new blog name is sweatismysanity.com
YES love morning runs! You will feel amazing all day long after a run like that or you might want to take a nap, who knows. I know what you mean about running in the dark, sometimes I think I run faster because I think I'm running from something, freaks me out but it's a very peaceful time of day to run and like you, it's the only time I can really fit it in..kids you know :-) Happy Training!
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Seriously, getting out of bed is the hardest part. Being out before the rest of the world wakes up is such a great way to kick-start my day. Also, as a business traveler, I find it almost mandatory to get out before the traffic starts in the big cities. Let's say I'm in Boston - I'll take 5 am over 5 pm any old day of the week.
There is no better feeling than going to work knowing you've already accomplished more than most people will all day.
My pace generally suffers on the pre-dawn runs - probably a function of not really being fully awake yet and being more careful due to poor visibility - but it's far preferable to not getting the miles in. Anybody have a solution?
You hit the nail on the head with why morning running is so appealing. Whenever my husband and I are out running early and we see cars, we say "hey- they shouldn't be out here. This is our time with the world!" :-) Nice job on the workout.
Sounds like a great run! Just keep safe out there! I don't like to run in the dark (morning or night) without Mike and I rarely do by myself because I would probably just freak myself out too much.
that sunrise is BEAUTIFUL! And yeah your possible ghost sighting sounds freaky. Stay safe!
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