The power of warming up? (Read 731 times)

I recently came to the realization that I only begin to really enjoy runs once I've hit 3-4 miles. I've read other threads about this before, and I am beginning to think that I am a slow warmer-upper, though you'd never guess it by the way I sweat. That said, I've noticed a strange trend in my HR this week. I use a HR monitor to keep me honest on my easy paces. It's annoying to have the alarm continually going off and trying to slow down, so I started to take it super super easy sometime last week. My avg HR was noticeably lower when I did this, but I easily ran negative splits without ever really noticing that my pace was increasing. My later laps around my loop were just naturally faster at about the same perceived effort. So, none of that is too weird until I compared yesterday and today. Yesterday, I decided to push it up just a little more, and ran like I previously did, bumping my upper HR limit and forcing myself to slow down when I did. I ran positive splits (excepting my warm-up loop), but my average pace was definitely faster than previous runs. Today, I ran super super easy again, staying far away from my HR limit, but again easily running negative splits. The strange thing, however, was that my last loop today at a super easy HR was at a faster pace than my fastest loop yesterday, but I never really bumped up against my HR limit. Sorry this is kind of long, but has anyone else noticed a similar phenomenon?

I suck suck suck for the first 3 miles. I have had looooong runs where the first 8 miles were slow and sluggish and then I picked it up with less effort.

What y'all said and more. First 2-3 miles always suck. I have to get through the initial shin tightness and I always, ALWAYS get a side stitch about 2 miles in. Might be on a different side, higher, lower but always crops up. By the end of mile 3 the stitch will be gone and my breathing gets in rythym with my footfalls and off I go. Damn, if I could figure out that side stitch. It's like death and taxes. I swear it's toying with me.

This is especially true because I'm an early morning runner. I notice when I get the rare chance to run later in the day it doesn't take as long to get warmed up.

I hadn't even considered that. I run early AM as well, but I've never done any training runs later in the day due to family time constraints. Thanks for your thoughts everyone.