Saturday's long run

Wow, you just couldn't have asked for a more beautiful morning to run! I slept in until about 7:15, hoping it'd warm up just a touch, then headed down to Coppell to try out a 6m loop around a long stretch of park there. It was about 55 degrees when I started and it warmed up slowly. It'd rained a couple times last week, so I thought the trails might be too wet, so I opted for some roadie miles this time.

Since I'd never been to the Andrew Brown park before, I wasn't exactly sure of the layout. My friend, Rob, had done some marathon training around this area before and recommended it. The park is right at the edge of a nice housing development. When I wasn't looking at the park itself, I was admiring people's landscaping and trying to get ideas. The MP3 player's battery died about 20 minutes into the run, so I had to squash downer thoughts by looking at the rest of the world. :)
http://www.mapquest.com/maps/coppell+tx/#a/maps/l:::Coppell:TX::US:32.954399:-97.014702:city:Dallas+County/m:hyb:11:32.978183:-96.995576:0::/io:0:::::f:EN:M:/e
The run itself felt really good. I worked mostly on form more than anything, as I'd talked to another runner recently about arm motion and footstrikes. With the sun at my back in these early morning hours, I could watch my form in the shadow. I could see a lot of twisting as my arms pumped across my body as opposed to the forward/back motion they should be doing. I also noticed that my shoulders would tighten up and start to encroach on my earspace. I could definitely feel a difference when I caught myself doing both of these things and recheck my form. I hope it eventually helps.

After the first loop, I headed back to the car to peel off the first layer. I started out on a second loop, got about 1/2 mile out and just couldn't get excited to go out for a second lap. I hopped in the car and along the way, decided to head out to Twin Coves for a few laps of hill training.

I ended up doing the remaining 6-ish miles I needed to do along that 2 mile out/back along the road. The legs were tired, but after each 2 mile out/back, I'd take a quick breather and get something to drink. I probably could've/should've done one more had I done a gel right before the 3rd loop, but my energy was spent. Learned something from this though.

I'd read and heard from others about Hammer's Recoverite http://www.hammernutrition.com/ for after you finish a long event. I got a sample in last weekend's race packet and decided to try it out. It has the right mix of protiens and carbs for post-workout fuel. It was a little chalky tasting, but I have to say that on Saturday afternoon and Sunday I didn't feel like I'd run 12 the day before (on pavement, no less). I'll have to see where I can find more of this stuff.

Good week. Gotta get my long run in Friday after work or early Saturday before heading down to Biloxi. Yikes!