Running Love and Hamstring Hatred

Tuesday! Today has been crazy busy, and it's just now 10am, yikes!


So after thinking yesterday morning about how fun my next 8M run would be, I decided I needed to do it today! Already going against my schedule reform, and it left me cutting it very close this morning.

I woke up to another fall weather-hinting morning. It was 78 again, with comparable humidity and a nice breeze, I could not have asked for nicer weather. Sure it will be a million degrees by 2pm, but if I can run before it gets disgusting then I don't really care.

With dead legs, tight hamstrings, and lots of plans this week, I knew it was best to take advantage of being awake early with the nice weather and do the 8 today. As mentioned, I planned to do 5 miles at marathon pace (9:40) and then 3 miles at goal half marathon pace (9:05), and I wanted negative splits the whole way. Since I almost always do a warm-up mile, I made sure I played the first 2 miles today more conservatively since I didn't have the time to do a true warm-up and would have to stop running at 8 miles. I figured this was a pretty adventerous run for an easy day, but to be honest my marathon pace is easy so I figured I would be safe.


8 Miles- 1:14:43, 9:20 average pace
Mile 1-  9:40
Mile 2-  9:38
Mile 3-  9:35
Mile 4-  9:33
Mile 5-  9:29
Mile 6-  9:03
Mile 7-  9:01
Mile 8-  8:58


I loved this run, I felt like I could have kept going for hours. I felt good starting out even without a true slow warm-up mile, maybe that's a hint. The hardest mile was the 1st one at half marathon pace, I struggled with the jump up a bit, but once I got adjusted the last 2 were easy. Despite feeling great while running, my legs once again got tight as soon as I stopped. My hamstrings, especially at the top are SO tight, and tons of stretching has given no improvement. I am glad I rearranged my schedule to have my mileage drop the next 2 days, I hope that will help relieve some of the pain before my next long run. The ususal stretches and foam rolling have not really been of much help, and I am not sure what else I should be doing, thoughts?


My calves and foot had been bothering me a bit the last few days, but I wore the new shoes today and I attribute that to such a great run, both felt great once I got started. I am trying to use the new shoes once this week, twice next week, 3x the week after, etc, until I am up to every day in them. I am also trying to wear out my other shoes that I don't love, but might as well get some use out of them and save the loveliness of the new ones as long as possible.