Sunday, February 3, 2008

Thoughts on Running

So Lisa and I (and several others) have signed up to run the Houston Rodeo Run 10K on March 1st...yeah 6.1 miles. Yikes! So yesterday we did a bit of a longer run, ~3.5 miles...good pace, good breathing, great weather. All in all a very good run.

Today was a different story. I decided that I was going to run 2 miles for time. For those of you who live in Houston, you know that today is an exceptionally humid day (currently 88% in my area). My first mile was great... 9 min 38s...and then I about died...I COULDN'T breathe! Seriously, it was like the air was getting stuck in the back of my throat! Does any one know of a lung implant I can get to filter the air? (Wouldn't that be a great invention??) So needless to say my second mile was just plain awful. First, I was running into hurricane-ish gale force winds (maybe a slight exaggeration...) granted...it did help to shove the air into my lungs...and then I had the Pain of Death in my side. Horrendous side cramp...which I used to my advantage by distracting myself with morbid scenes of myself collapsing on the side of the road because it was really acute appendicitis (overactive imagination..me?...never...). So definitely not my best mile ever. Oh well...

So bottom line, pray that the humidity on March 1st isn't ridiculous..under 30% would be great (and for you Arizonans out there, 30% humidity is NOT humid :) ).

5 comments:

Heather said...

That's why in TX, you have to run EARLY in the morning if you want to run outside, or you act like a goob and run at noon or 2 pm until your body finally gets used to it :) crazy--but you can actually get used to it--it's just "moronish" to do so :) Personally, I've grown to like running on my treadmill in the nice AC :) not sure how well I'd do in an outside race right now! Great job on the 9.5 min mile though!!

B said...

When it gets over 10% humidity I go hide under my bed.


On a completely unrelated topic, have you read this nyt article? It's a few weeks old but I thought it was great:

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/01/11/is-space-exploration-worth-the-cost-a-freakonomics-quorum/

Erin said...

Hooray for at least getting out and running, though! I feel your pain - that humidity just kills. Cramps, breathing pains, non-existant cooling mechanisms... No fun. Not to mention the fact that the wind actually makes it harder to breath!

Adrienne Renea said...

I gonna try to come out there and root ya'll on!
"Ya-Ya!"
I should find some pom-poms.....

Rob, Melissa, Luke & Joel Green said...

I guess I went running the same day, cause I had the same problems!!

-M