Weekend Warrior

I had a marvelous holiday weekend! If you read my last post, my anxiety was obvious... so I took the last four days to focus on my family and relaxation. We spent the holiday weekend at home and loved every minute of it!  The weather was perfect sunshine, allowing us to practically live in our backyard. I sip my coffee on this Monday morning with a big smile, absolutely in love with my little family of four.

The best part of our holiday was that we all had free time to do what we each enjoy. The girlies swam... a lot. Hubby got in a round of golf. And I scored a long bike ride and a long run.

A LONG RIDE
Friday morning, I rose with the sun and took Her Majesty out for ride. My previous longest ride was 25 miles. However, I have Venus de Miles (61 mile ride) coming up in a few weeks, so I need to start pushing my mileage.

I headed out on my favorite country route to Hanna City. There is a smooth wide shoulder that is perfect for biking. The edges gets a little rough around Trivoli (home of my first flat tire), so I turned off onto a side road when I couldn't take it anymore. I saw a water tower in the far distance and decided to head towards it. Unlike running, biking takes me back to my childhood, when I grew up outside the city. There is a tranquility on country roads and I enjoy being in the middle of nowhere. Road signs are sparse. Traffic is low. Everyone waves hello. And water towers are used to sight direction. (I know some people run on country roads, but that just doesn't feel safe to me - plus I've had a few encounters with farm dogs running on country roads back home.)

The true mark of Illinois... cornfields everywhere!

My phone dinged at 20 miles, which was my signal to turn it back home. But I was so close to the next water tower that I pushed a couple extra miles ahead to Elmwood. I made a quick stop in the center-of-town park that is a bit of a landmark there.  I ate my powerbar for fuel, washed it down... and then took my first fall while trying to take a picture. It was my first ride with my new clipless pedals. Note to self: When you stop, unclip both feet.

I took a slightly different route on the way home and encountered some challenging hills. Ugh. My legs grew tired and my ass was burning from the saddle. I had forked out some cash for new cycling shorts with built-in padding, hoping they would help on these long rides, but not so much.  By time I finished - 44.25 miles -  all I wanted to do was sit on an ice block to cool my sore booty.

A LONG RUN
Well sort of. 10 miles is long for me these days. On Sunday, I barely completed the 10 mile task. I had all sorts of mind-doubting games going on as we headed down the trail. Thankfully, I had a couple friends to distract me. I'm quite positive that without KO, I would have cut it short. I thought it was nice temps, but the humidity made it so hard to breathe and my legs once again felt like I was carrying bricks. What is going on with my run lately?

I find it slightly depressing that I ran a marathon less than three months ago. Why does endurance wean away so quickly? I've been trying to keep a double-digit in my weekly routine, but they seem to be getting more difficult. The recent humidity is my sworn enemy. Honestly, I'm just not a fan of summer running. It's odd I know. Everyone else seems to "pick up" their running in summer and I'm just the opposite. July and August are notoriously my lowest run mileage months. I'll take trudging through snow any day. And I lick my chops in anticipation for those cool autumn mornings...

I keep plugging away because I know it will make me stronger.
But no lying, I've had this sentiment lately...