14 miles of snot-rockety windy fun.

Today wrapped up my first week of marathon training with a lovely 14-mile run in high winds and sleet during the last half of the run.  It wasn't my best run, but it was a run that got done.

This run was supposed to be what my training schedule says is a "pace run," where you start out 45 seconds or so slower than your goal marathon pace and then slowly increase your pace so that you are running at your goal pace by the end.  Because you can't freaking tell what the hell is going on from my splits above, I'll just tell you--my goal marathon pace is between 10:00 and 10:30.

Yeah.  So much for that pace run, huh?  It was the winds.  (And maybe all the slowing down for snot rockets.)

Every time my paces slow down, it means I had turned in a direction where the wind was blowing on me in its rude cold way; it takes me a bit to get used to it and get back up to pace.  Looking at this, it seems I really ran several smaller pace runs.  Let me tell you, my quads were on fire by the end; running into that wind just sucks the energy right out of them. Well, it was either the wind or the quad sleeves I decided to wear for this run that tuckered them out.  I'm not sure yet how I feel about wearing the quad sleeves while running.  Calf sleeves?  You betcha; I don't even notice them.  Quad sleeves?  Hmmm...I love them for recovery, but my quads felt so constrained, so heavy with them on from the start of the run.  I'm undecided about this quad sleeve issue at the moment; I need to gather more data.

But because I believe you learn something on every run, here are some learnings about which I am undecidedly decided about:

• Carrying a water bottle when doing winter running sucks.  The hand holding the bottle always gets super cold, especially my pinky fingers.  One day I fear those pinky fingers will fall off and shatter on the ground, and then I'll really be screwed.
• Just because something doesn't hurt during a run doesn't mean it won't hurt afterwards.  My peroneal tendons on my right foot have decided to keep my left Achilles company in hurting.
• The Weather Channel's site lies to me on a regular basis.  That damn sleet wasn't supposed to start until 8 PM, but it got to me at around 3:30 PM.  Every time I got stung in the face by a little ball of angry sleet, I was cursing those bastards.  
• All dogs were behind fences along my route.  This one's a keeper.
• I really enjoy only knowing my pace for a mile after I have ran it.  It helps me focus on the run.  Thanks, Garmin 910XT!
• Cheese and crackers is probably the worst pre-run snack you could ever have.  Besides bran cereal, I guess.
• In high winds make sure your snot rockets don't ricochet upwards into your eyeball.

Since I missed my easy 5 miler on Wednesday, going to have to do that tomorrow plus some weights just to round out the day.  But I've had enough of the winds--think I may just wimp out and hit the treadmill tomorrow (still gathering more data on those quad sleeves).