10 Mile Long Run

Gilbert had us do a relaxed 10 miler this morning, after last week's 16 miler. Tracy, Patrick and I met at 6:30 am on a glorious morning, and set off to do the Longhorn Dam loop from RunTex. The weather was, once again, absolutely perfect. High 40's at the start of the run, warming gently to mid 50's by the end of it. While we were stretching afterwards, it had warmed a little more, which felt just great. But, I get ahead of myself.

We had pledged that we would run a controlled pace today, even though it was a short long run. We ended up with miles in the 9:40-9:30 range for most of the run, which were right in my happy heartrate zone, and sped up for the last couple of miles to the 8:15-8:30 range. Overall run just over 10 miles, 9:33 overall pace. It felt really good, and we were totally conversational for all of the run until the last two miles.

Stretching was with the entire Gazelles gang, and everyone seemed very happy to be out there on such a pretty day.

Next weekend is the long-dreaded 18 mile run up to and over Mount Bonnell, then to FM 2222, and back up and over Bonnell on the way back. We sure will stay under pace control on that one!

I chatted with Gilbert afterwards about various items of concern, mainly regarding the long-range schedule for runs leading up to Freescale. He's a genuinely nice guy, and a great coach. We're lucky to have him.

Tomorrow I lead the Galloway time goal folks through their hill repeat workout.