First Saturday Morning Team Run!!

Saturday morning, day 25 of training, and I was up at 4:45 a.m. and on the interstate by 5:00 a.m. heading into downtown Charleston to meet our team at Colonial Lake for our first morning team run. We were supposed to be there and ready to run by 6:00 a.m. and I was. Everyone trickled in between 5:30 and 6:00 and we were off and running by about 6:15. Once again everyone split off into groups running either 4 miles, 6 miles, 8 miles and I think I heard perhaps 11 miles!?!? Seeing as I was in the first group of 4 milers, I really didn't have to listen to the rest of the information for the longer distance runners.

We headed out around 6:15ish and did a warm up lap around Colonial Lake and then proceeded on down Broad Street all the way to the Joe Riley Stadium once again. This time we were greeted at the stadium by a gorgeous looking bottle of Gatorade to quench our thirst. Just a quick sip of Gatorade and then back to Colonial Lake!

4.22 miles in right at an hour and 12 minutes, for an average of approximately 17 minutes per mile. On the date of the actual race, we have to pace ourselves at 16 minutes per mile, so I was glad to see I was not really too far off at the beginning of my training. Since I have a little over 3 months to go with training, surely I can get much faster than 16 minutes per mile.

Right now we are just worried about the heat. The temps have been in the high 90s and 100s already which is why we run so early. However, during the week I dont have time to run in the mornings so I run when I get home from work. But even then, it is still 90-95 degrees at 6:00 or 7:00 at night. Trying to convince myself to drink plenty of water throughout the day to help keep hydrated....very hard for me to do since a bottle of water would usually last me a day or two since I dont drink that much, but I'm trying my best!

Tomorrow, Sunday, is a day of complete rest for our training so, once again, I will be glad to oblige by that rule! Today was pretty rough since I am not a morning person at all. Not only did I get up at 4:45 a.m., but then I ran 4.22 miles only to come home to go to lunch and some shopping with hubby, then back out in the heat to do some clothes shopping with Jessica. Then we had a family anniversary party to go to which of course I had to make my famous mac n' cheese for. I did manage to squeeze in about a 30 minute nap between shopping and dinner, but not sure that even helped. By 10:00 p.m. I was pretty much exhausted and couldn't wait to lay my head down on the pillow!

Hope everyone had a great week/weekend!

Tina