Workouts - August 3, 2015 and My Son Ran His First Race!

August 03, 2015

Workouts - August 3, 2015 and My Son Ran His First Race!

Happy August! For those of us in the Deep South, August is a reason to celebrate. We are in the middle of an unbearably hot summer, and August means September is right around the corner! Seriously, not a day goes by that I don't fantasize about cool(er) fall temperatures.

This week was a bit different. I ran last week's long run on Sunday, so I sort of pushed everything forward by a day. Also, W ran his first little race, the kids' kilometer at my track club's Saturday Social.

Monday: hour-long Spin class at the gym, followed by 20 minutes on the TRX rack for abs and shoulders.

Tuesday: 5.3 miles on my favorite downtown loop, 9:00 pace on the nose (not planned!). It was a bit hotter than I thought (hahaha), so I stopped in a coffee shop for water, and they were really nice about it. Then, not a minute later I was very nearly hit by a car that ran a stop sign. I had to dive onto some bushes. The driver rolled down his window and said, "OK?" When I replied, "Yeah, but you ran that stop sign," he just shouted "F**K YOU, LADY!" Lovely. He was a younger guy, maybe 25-30, with brown hair and a round face, driving a newer bright blue Pontiac sedan. What a jerk.

Wednesday: 3.6 miles in Railroad Park, 9:12 pace. I planned to run more, but it was so humid that I didn't leave the park. I followed that with 20 minutes of TRX legs at home.

Thursday: 6 miles on the treadmill, aerobic, which ended up being 9:20 pace.

Friday: Rest.

Saturday: 11.5 miles, 9:10 pace, with the track club. We started at the Vulcan, which was a nice downhill send-off but OH MY LORD the climb back up at the end! Getting up that hill at the end of a longer run is a...meditative experience. The reason this run was faster was because the weather really improved (calm your tits, it was about 74 degrees and 60% humidity, instead of the usual 85 degrees and 99% humidity haha). I ran with the 9:00 pace group until the very end.

Sunday: hour-long Spin class, immediately after LEG DAY. I spent an hour doing a full leg set with free weights. Foreshadowing: I did my Monday morning run the next day, and yikes.

Totals: 26.4 miles of running, two spin classes, three weight training sessions.

Saturday's long run was staged at the Birmingham Track Club's annual Vulcan Social. They have staggered runs with pace leaders, music, free food, and a kids' one-kilometer run. After I finished my run, Nate and W joined me. The running community here is so friendly and close-knit that they wanted to say hello. Even though W is pretty small, he ran the kids' race. He absolutely knows what racing is, and knows the words "run," "race," and "GO!" He was pretty excited for the run, and did 99% of it at an actual run. He's a good sport, too, and he cheered for the faster kids as they passed him. He finished dead last, but he was the only runner younger than 3, so I told him he won his age group, haha. On to the photos!