Welcome Back Long Run

Milestone time. I have now successfully completed my longest run since 2010. Sunday's run was 15 miles. It went pretty well. After a rainy Saturday, Sunday was beautiful and I convinced a few people to join me for part of my distance. Since it was Halloween weekend, I figured it was as good a time as any to do a "test run" in my Mickey costume. (Oddly enough, I didn't get any strange looks. Not sure what that says about our running community....) You can all rest easy knowing the outfit got passing marks. I had no problems with any part of the costume so I will be dressed as Mickey Mouse for the marathon. I mean, seriously, how cute is this?

At this point in my training, I've discovered a few new things.

Hunger is now starting to be a real thing. I've started getting hunger pangs, as in my stomach physically hurts, at completely random times. Once last week, it was an hour and a half after I'd eaten dinner. I tried to ignore it because I was getting ready to go to bed but it wasn't long before I realized that there would be no sleeping until I ate something. So now I keep graham crackers on hand for these emergency munchies that spring up. They are easily portable, have a satisfying crunch to them, are conveniently portion controlled and are a lower sugar/calorie/fat option than a lot of other convenient foods. 

My cheap sports bra has a distance threshold. And that threshold is somewhere shy of 15 miles. I mostly wear good-quality Moving Comfort sports bras but I also have one cheaper brand I got at TJ Maxx a while back. It hadn't steered me wrong in the past but in the past, a "long" run was only 8 or 9 miles. I now have a couple of lovely strawberry-colored reminders to wear only the good stuff from now on.

For the first time ever, I kind of like that Daylight Saving Time has ended. I'm new to this whole morning running thing and I've been running in complete darkness during the week for the last month or so. This morning was the first time in weeks I didn't have to bring my lights with me on my run. Small things make me happy.

Sometimes the 5:40 freight train is more like the 6:25 freight train. As I mentioned several entries ago, unbeknownst to me before this fall, there is a freight train that comes through Uptown Normal at approximately 5:40 in the morning. How soon I get to the train tracks determines which direction I can run. This morning I crossed the tracks with no sign of the train and didn't give it much thought as I ran another 2 miles. And then on my way back home....stuck. Thankfully, I wasn't on too tight of a schedule because I stood there waiting for the darn thing to pass for a good several minutes.

The schedule this week is a little tough. I work 3 weeknights at Fleet Feet instead of my normal 2 and 2 of them are later nights than normal. I'm supposed to do another back-to-back set of long runs this weekend but I have to both attend a departmental retreat and a facilitate a focus group on Friday so I won't be able to go in late. It's "Suck it Up Buttercup" time!