Gooooooooooooooood morning! Dragging my butt out of bed this morning to run was well worth it for this:
As I always say, waking up early to run sucks big time when that alarm goes off, but just remember how awesome you’ll feel when you’re out there/done. 🙂 That, and having someone to meet really helps!
I met up with my buddy Sokphal at 6:45 to get in 7 miles. She’s marathon training and offered to do some of the miles on her own if I didn’t want to run that far, but who am I to turn down a challenge? I’m trying to not let my endurance tank even though I’m not training right now, so I went with it.
This was a tough run – I felt reeeeeally sluggish and it was SUPER humid, but good conversation and beautiful views kept me pushing through. Not gonna lie though, pretty much the whole time I was fighting with myself and wanting to just walk the whole thing. 😉
If I’d been alone, I definitely would have walked some of it or at least stopped early. Another reason I love running buddies – I may bail on myself, but I won’t bail on someone else! And you CAN do it… you just might not want to. Mind over matter!
I tried out some new running shoes on the run – the Ghost 7s, which I was gifted as part of my ongoing Run Happy Ambassadorship with Brooks. They wanted their blogger ambassadors to try out one of their two most updated shoes for fall – the Ghosts or the Glycerin 12. I decided to go Ghost!
As you guys know, I normally wear the Brooks Ravenna, which I love, but I was open to checking out something new. It’s good to mix it up sometimes with your running shoes!
The Ghost 7s are a neutral running shoe, so they are best for people who don’t pronate a ton; that said, I mildly pronate and found these shoes comfortable and supportive on this morning’s 7 miler. They were also pretty lightweight for a more cushioned shoe, which I liked! Only 0.1 ounce heavier than my Ravennas, and I didn’t notice it. Another pro: there are no-sew overlays and minimal stitching, so the shoes are flexible and fit closer to your foot, and they felt really breathable, too, since there’s mesh. One thing I liked more than the Ravennas, randomly, was actually the shoelaces! They were a really stretchy material and super easy to tie, stayed put, and less bulky, too. Overall, I give the shoes 2 thumbs up! I still prefer my Ravennas I think overall for really long runs, but for medium length runs, I’ll swap these in just to mix it up. Loved the colors, too – there are more on the website!
Anyway! Sokphal and I did an out and back along the Mt. Vernon Trail, our standard fave. We ran by the airport, and I was really happy to not be on a plane/traveling. 🙂
A little over 7 miles – boom!
This has been a run-tastic week already, because yesterday morning I also had a great run: this time at the track, with my friend Chelsea!
The sun was just rising when we met there, and there must have been some groups meeting there, because it was MOBBED! Even though for some reason there’s no one in the photo below… I swear it was crowded! Luckily people cleared out relatively quickly, and we had plenty of space for our workout.
Chelsea and I went running together a couple months ago and talked about how we’d both like to get into track workouts and work on speed this fall, so we decided to make a weekly track date. Track Tuesdays or bust!
We did one of my favorite track workouts:
- Warm up for about a mile (4 laps)
- Jog the curves, sprint the straights for about 2 miles
- Cool down for up to a mile
- We ended up finishing in 3.5 miles instead of the planned 4, which was fine since we were both totally wiped out by then, anyway! Whew – speed is tough. It felt really good to run fast and stretch out my legs, though! #SweatyBeasts
Chelsea and I are going to work on increasing the amount of sprinting we do over the next couple months – after a few more weeks of jog the curves, sprint the straights, we’ll amp it up to sprinting a half lap and jogging half, then up to 3/4 of a lap, then up to a full lap (a 400). Baby steps! 🙂
Our splits:
- Mile 1: 9:10 (warm up)
- Mile 2: 8:14 (alternating the jogging curves, sprinting straights)
- Mile 3: 8:06
- 0.5 mile cool down pace: 8:56
Thanks for the awesome workout, Chelsea! Excited to see our speed improve in the coming weeks. 🙂
How have your runs been this week? I can’t WAIT until the weather cools down for us!
If you run with music, what’s your favorite song to Run Happy to and why? Brooks is going to create a Spotify playlist perfect for long training runs, and they’ll add the most popular 3-5 songs from each of their ambassador’s blog readers to make up the master playlist! I’ll share it once it’s up so you guys can use it! 🙂
