Careful with those icy cold showers. Too quick a temperature change like that can send your body into shock. Sounds like you were borderline there. Glad you made it ok, though.

You're right of course about the shower. Actually, it started off luke warm, and I gradually made it colder as I went. I guess I wasn't feeling too smart this AM. Thanks for checking in!

Losing tons of water... I can't imagine how much sweat I've lost this past week or so. When I'm done running, I peel off my clothes and leave them outside, thinking they'll dry off a bit by the end of the day so I can put them in the laundry hamper, and it's still just as wet at the end of the day. The grass fields that I run barefoot in are filling up with mushrooms. I rotate 3 pairs of running shoes, and they are all squishy. And stinky. Yeah, it's been muggy for a while now. An easy 7 miles this AM. Took it nice and easy after yesterday's meltdown. Felt pretty good. Soggy, but good. Ran the last mile barefoot on the grass. I love finishing up that way. I could even get the top off the gatorade bottle after my run this time! (See yesterdays post). Walked the dog a couple of miles after then run for a nice cooldown. A good day. Tomorrow calls for 14 miles. It's supposed to be even hotter and muggier than it's been. I'm thinking I need to get up at 4:30am to have half a chance of getting through it. I'm also thinking of toning down my goal time for Steamtown. I'm just not hitting the times in training that I need to be hitting. Maybe it's the heat and humidity. More than likely, it's a combination of that and the fact that I just started back running again only a few weeks ago and was overly optimistic about bouncing back quickly. So for now, I'm gonna add 10 seconds/mile to my marathon goal pace and adjust my training paces accordingly and see how that goes.

Steamtown is still a couple months away. I felt that way last year when I was getting ready for Baltimore; especially after I ran a hard Philly Distance Run and killed my times for the rest of the week. Keeping realistic goals is key, but I wouldn't completely drop your goals. Set a series of them; have your primary goal, then your secondary and tertiary goals. btb, where abouts do you live, by the way? You may have mentioned, and I probably missed it.

Tim, Realistic is the key word. If I wasn't forced into a 6 week layoff recently, things would be different. I think I was being overly optimistic about bouncing back and therefore kept thinking I could hit my original goal. But you are right, you have to stay flexible with goals. A lot can happen in a couple of months, and I've done this enough to know that often times, things seem to just suddenly kick in and click, and you are running times that just a couple months earlier seemed impossible. I live in wine and farm country out on eastern Long Island, NY.

Hey Bob, I'll be running Steamtown as well. This heat and humidity really sucks doesn't it! Good luck tomorrow on your 14 miler. I have an 18 miler this weekend that I swear I'lll need to be up at 4 am so I don't have the heat and humidity to deal with.

Hi Pam, Training in all this gunk will only make us stronger and faster for Steamtown, where we will be greeted with cool, crisp air, right? That's what I keep telling myself anyway. Thanks for dropping by, and thanks for the good luck for tomorrow's run. I just hope I don't slosh right out of my shoes! Good luck to you with your run this weekend, be careful out there. I just checked the long range forecast. It looks like we are stuck with this stuff for a while. Oh well, just buckle down and do what you have to do, right?

The dog days of summer.... Wet footprints tracked thoughout the house. Puddles left behind if you stand in one spot for more that 2 seconds. All your shoes are squishy. Your clothes are totally soaked BEFORE they go into the wash. You crave salty things. A gallon of Gatorade only lasts one day. You barely use any hot water in the shower. Your don't even want to look at your watch to see how slowly you are running, it's too depressing. Today's 14 miler wasn't pretty. But it's done. By mile 2, I was wondering "how on earth am I gonna get through this?". One squishy step at a time, that's how. A lot of my problem today was in my head I'm sure, but the end of today's run couldn't come soon enough. Got up at 4:30am and was on the road by 5am. It didn't matter, it was still a sauna out there. The 3/4 moon shone brightly in the dark sky, and cast shadows on the ground. A lot of deer were out and about, feeding away before going into hiding during the daytime. The big red marble sun made it's appearance on the horizion between miles 7 and 8, and I was trying to tell it to go back to sleep for a while. It didn't listen, and instead turned up the oven temperature to mock me. My body was covered with little black bugs, stuck to my sweat. I was thinking about how gorillas groom each other by eating the bugs off each other. They would've had a feast with me. The one thing that helped me the most through this run was thinking about Steamtown, and how all of this will be worth it. Finished up the last mile barefoot on the grass fields, and I lucked out because they had the irrigation going, so I made sure I ran though that. Boy did that feel great! Overall, my pace stayed fairly consistent. Consistenly slow, but consistent. It was good to be done. The next longish run is Saturday. This heat is supposed to continue through the weekend, so it will probably be a repeat of today. I scheduled a massage for after the run Saturday. It's been a while since I had one, and boy does this body need it.

Boy does that sound familiar... The only bad part for us in Houston is we have about 4.5-5 months of it...

Oh I know you guys have it worse. I really shouldn't complain. Hats off to all you out there that have to deal with this on a much longer basis than I do.

I tell you after I injured my ankle the first few runs in the humidity and heat I really really enjoyed. I guess that's cause I was just happy to run.

You know, I thought of this during my run today too, and often times on my other runs that aren't going so well. If I were sitting home this AM and couldn't run, I'd be wishing I was out there. We gotta keep reminding ourselves of that.

Didn't help that my mp3 player ran out of juice so I got to listen to everyone at the shooting range.

You run at a shooting range? I guess that's one way to work on your speed, by dodging bullets!

WTG @ getting your 14 miler in!!! Hopefully this weekends long run won't feel so bad!

Thanks! And the same to you!

OH btw your description sounded like last Sunday for me. The whole squishy step at a time and all the bugs. I think I was covered head to toe in them

Good thing we aren't bug-o-phobic! It's amazing what we'll put up with to get our runs in.