Notes of a long run

When you run for more than 1.5 hours, things happen. Good things. Bad things. Wretched things. Wonderful things. These are a few of the things that happened to me on Friday’s long run.

1. DIABETES RUNNING EXPERIMENT:
Instead of running with my insulin pump latched to my shorts’ waistband, which is annoying as heck feeling as though your shorts are gonna be pulled down at any moment, I decided to try and wear it on my fuel belt. I brought the pump and its tubing up through the top of my shirt and had Big Ring latch it onto the back of the belt between the water bottles. And you know what, I didn’t think about it, didn’t feel it, didn’t get annoyed by it once. Brilliant!

2. BURNED BY GEL:
So remember how last week I was singing the praises of Vega’s sport gel? Well folks, it didn’t take long for my tune to drastically change. Just one run; practically a record!

And it’s really quite silly, because when I grabbed that gel out of my drawer and saw it was raspberry flavoured, I knew that I should have just thrown it right back in, or better yet, out. While I love raspberries as an actual fruit – love them! – I do NOT at all like raspberry flavouring for anything! Yogurt, sugar tabs, jam, drinks, gels – I’ve been burned by them all! But the memory of last week’s run, and the happy shock of Vega’s orange zest gel, persuaded me to give the raspberry a go. BIG MISTAKE! Not even a half a second into squeezing and I was gagging. Even now, just thinking about it, has me retching. Blech 🙁

3. DIRECTIONALLY CHALLENGED:
It’s no secret I get lost pretty much wherever I go. And so, when Big Ring and I started doing these Friday tag-team run/cycle days in the city, we were both sure I’d be calling him non-stop for additional directions. But I didn’t. One run. Two runs. Three runs. Four. Not once did I get lost. With Big Ring’s explicit directions written on paper AND again on my hand, I was starting to think my mind had transformed into the perfect little GPS.

It was that cockiness that killed me!

With just a few kilometres left to go, I knew I had to make a turn onto NW Marine to head down towards my final destination at Spanish Banks. I was waiting for it. I had my eyes peeled. I passed a few groups of beach dwellers heading in the opposite direction, and thought, hmm, they must have got up real early for those sun rays. The road was a familiar road, I’d ridden it tons of times with Big Ring – coming BACK from the beach! Oh freak. I looked up. I was already on NW Marine. What the??? Turns out I had missed my turn, and had run 10 minutes out of the way. Tack on another kilometre why don’t we!

4. THE AFTER EFFECTS:
This run was supposed to be 90 minutes of a 5:30-5:45 min/km pace, with 5 minutes of intense running every 20 minutes and a 1 minute walk break every 25 minutes.  It ended up being closer to 100 minutes, which probably doesn’t sound like much, but tell that to my feet, calves, thighs, and glutes!

The top of my foot was bruised from the heat swelling and laces rubbing. The bottom of my foot had cramping Tourettes. My legs felt as though they’d been used as a punching bag for 10 hours. And my butt, oh my poor, poor butt, it was pained just by sitting!

Hello foam roller my old friend 😀

FRIDAY’S LONG RUN:

• 9:45 a.m. BG before: 5.3
• Temp. basal: none
• Carbs: 2T Pocketfuel (12g) no bolus
• Time: 1:38:07
  
• Distance: 17.06 km
  
• Average pace: 5:45 min/km
• Fuel: @45 minutes: BG 4.8 Vega gel (22g)
•           @75 minutes: BG 5.5 2T Pocketfuel (12g)
• 12:30 p.m. BG after: 6.2

And this is what greeted me at the end. Pure beauty!

Ps. I am no longer calling my long runs long, slow distance runs. When I compare my pace from pre-pregnancy to now, and when I’m incorporating tempo speeds into the mix, there is nothing slow about it. I’m just saying!