Less Heat, More Smoke

Well the temperature has cooled down into the 80's but the smoke from the nearby fires has steadily increased since Sunday. The sky is hazy and you can really smell it in the air but it's not that bad.

Weekly totals for last week:

Swim: 5,700 yards
Bike: 91 miles
Run: 26.5 miles

Last Thursday evening I had eight miles on the schedule but when I got off work it was close to 100 and I was really tired so I took a nap on the couch and just spent the evening relaxing. The next morning I got up and ran five easy miles to make up for what I had missed the night before. Luckily I didn't have anything on the schedule for that evening since it was 103 when I got off work. I spent the evening relaxing, watching The Rundown, and eating some pasta and garlic toast.

Saturday morning I knew I should plan on getting up at 6:00 and heading out for my run; instead I slept in till around 7:30 and hit the trail a little after 8:00. When I started the temp was in the mid 70's. The first 4.5 miles I was keeping my pace around 8:10/8:15 and was feeling good. I decided to do a loop that includes a large hill because I was tired of the same ole out and back route. While approaching the hill I noticed that the cross walk indicator was about to go to red and the light would be changing so I picked up the pace and dashed across the street. The hill starts right after the crossing so like an idiot I kept up the increased pace and pushed hard up the hill - yeah, that didn't work out so well. I did learn a lesson about pushing hard in places where I should be conservative even if I feel like I have an energy store because chances are I will need that energy later on in the run. I stopped at the top of the hill and had a drink and my first ever Gu (I usually have Clif Blox); I have to say it was pretty darn good. Tasted just like vanilla frosting. About a mile after having the Gu I started getting a side ache but I can't say if that was from drinking too much water during my break, pushing hard on the hill, or because I was heating up. The next six miles of the run are shadeless and I could tell that the air temp was heating up fairly quickly. I looked at my Garmin and knew I was going to come in over the 10 miles that were on my schedule so I tried to slow down a bit and take it easy. In the last three miles I took a few breaks and finished my water. I thought about taking a diversion to a park to refill my bottle but I was really starting to feel burned out so I decided to stop at 11 miles, buy a bottle of Gatorade, and walk the remaining half mile back to the house. When I got home I checked the temp and it was 95; by 12:30 it was 105. I spent the afternoon napping in the air conditioning and watching TV.

Sunday morning I woke up rested (thanks to the eight hours of sleep that night and the four hours of napping I did Saturday afternoon) and headed out for a group ride on a new route. The ride was supposed to be 47 miles so I figured I would get around 51/52 by riding to the meeting spot. We headed out a few minutes after 9:00 for what turned out to be a great ride. The forecasted high that day was 88 and it felt wonderful compared to the previous days. The ride had some long steady climbs which led to some really great views of the surrounding area. We got out onto some winding roads which are primarily used by locals and motorcyclists so the traffic was very minimal and the road condition was pretty good. The last 20 miles of the ride I pushed really hard because I needed to pick Jen up at the BART station a little after 12:00. I'm not sure what my average pace was for those miles, or the ride in general, because my computer died about five miles into the ride. I checked the route out on Google so I could remember the turns and plan on taking Jen on it sometime in the next couple of weeks.