It IS the heat AND the humidity

I knew our break from truly yucky weather wouldn't last long. Saturday was proof positive of that.

The long run was scheduled to be 10 miles, and I knew it was going to be a warm one. I'd been watching the weather reports all week and 85 degrees was predicted across the board. It was going to happen eventually, so I dressed as appropriately as possible, grabbed my Gatorade, and headed out the door. Little did I know that mentally preparing for the weather was quite going to cut it.

Suffice it to say, Saturday's 10 miles were some of the most difficult I think I've ever run. It was a struggle indeed! I thought I was going to have to turn around early. I thought I was going to have to stop early. Our pacer slowed us down a little bit, and we took an extra walk break. One of my buddies did stop because she was feeling dizzy. But I ended up finishing strong. I'm glad that I did too, but it was great reminder that as a runner, I'm still learning. Plus, I was once again reminded that it takes a while to adjust to the heat and humidity.

A friend of mine who runs with the 9:30 pace group told me an amusing story about her run on Saturday. Their 9:30 pacer wasn't there, so they had one of the 8:30 pacers lead them instead. Rather than taking it easy due to the weather, their pacer had them running at a 9 minute pace nearly.

I'm glad this wasn't the week that the 10:00 pacers couldn't make it! If I had been running 9:30's on Saturday, I'd probably be dead by now. I wonder if maybe instead of high altitude training, I should try to do high temperature training? You know, maybe move to Arizona in the middle of the summer and run at noon. Sounds like fun, right?