Someones gotta yack for it to be considered a work out...right!?!

After a lazy Saturday putting gutters on 1 side of the garage before getting rained on I joined Steph and here sisters & brother-in-law for dinner at one of our fav. places to eat...The Chatterbox. Love that place! I had the make your own Mac and Cheese. Mine had sausage, grilled chicken, bell peppers and onions. It was delicious! Mmmmm....

So Mn was hot and rainy all weekend and I had an 18 miler on the schedule. Earlier in the week Pharmie and I decided to join up and tackle the heat together. So Sunday morning at 5:30 am I showed up at her place ready to run. Kinda. I set everything out the night before knowing that 5am would come to quickly and I would forget something...well even with setting everything out I forgot something....the bottles to the fuel belt. Ugg...Pharmie was nice enough to empty one of her's and throw some of my Gatorade in there.

The beginning part of the run was pretty uneventful, which is good! When we left that morning the weather station had St. Paul at 75 degrees and 85%+ humidity (if I remember right). We just cruised along and grabbed a drink around mile 3, refilled and kept on our way. Mile 3 - 5'ish we were along the marathon route (going backwards) and I was getting that "urge." Well shortly Pharmie and I got off the path to hit up the restrooms at a local Dunn Brothers....whew, that was close. Back on the trail, Miles 5-7 are just cruising along..drinking (maybe hydrating is a better term?) and chatting. Miles 7 - 9 I was starting to feel it a bit...I think the heat was starting to get to me. The sun was stuck behind some clouds but I just felt zapped on the smalled of inclines. At mile 9 we turned around after a short discussion about how far we were going and i was confused (maybe still asleep).

We reached a drinking fountain at 8.8 miles, according to Mr. Garmin, and Pharmie said lets just go .2 more and turn around and then hit up the drinking fountain. I'm like, what? But then we would be turning around at 9 and the drinking fountain would be 9.2...are you trying to make me run an extra .2? DUH BORSCH! If we turn around at 9 and go back the way we came will we finish with 18 miles. I don't know what my deal was, somewhere in my head I was fixed that the "Bubbler" was the mid point.

After that brain fart we ate, drank and were under way. I was feeling better simply because Pharmie took the water bottles...I carried both on the way out and she got them on the way back. I was hoping that would slow her down on the way back..it didn't. Maybe a mile after the turn around I was feeling the heat again...we stopped at every possible drinking fountain (about every 2 miles) for me to drink, refil and throw water on my head and back.

With a little over 3 miles to go Pharmie was still feeling great and I had an HR in the 170's at a 10:20 pace...ekk! Borsch is burnin up! Pharmie gave me a bottle and went on her way, she wanted to push it home and I decided to settle into whatever pace held me in Zone 3..no higher! Well with the toughest part of the marathon course coming up I was in for it. The chart below shows our route...we pretty much started around mile marker 22, rank to around 13.5 and headed back the same way.

Right about that nice spike in the middle of the hill is where I decided I could no longer keep my past few hours worth of gels, shot blocks, water and Nuun in my stomach anymore! YACK! I felt better after yacking but man that sucked! A nice lady stopped and gave me some water, since my bottle was already out (only 1.5 miles up the hill). I thanked her and she went on her speedy way...she had to be doing 7's. I made it nearly home before I felt like yacking again so I called it quits at 17.8. This week 17.8 miles = 18 miles. The walk back was nice and calm...I'm sure my legs would not have felt that good without it.

Steph and Steve made us all a delicious breakfast...pancakes with blueberries, strawberries and chocolate chunks...mmmm...what a wonderful variety! Thanks guys!

The run is a success in my book! I worked hard, covered the miles and am happy with it...all before 10 am to! I think I'm on my way to my goal for the year...finish Twin Cities, have fun and be able to say I ran hard.

Today I'm heading out for a nice recovery ride and I'm going to enjoy this long awaited recovery week!