six more miles...

today the soreness showed up as expected and, midday, so did the rain. i was relieved to have gotten in that 6 mile run yesterday. as a consequence, there really wasn't any pressure to go outside and run today. but as the late afternoon turned into early evening and the rain stopped, that little voice inside of me started in with, "so why don't you get in a few easy miles after being cooped up in the house all this time?"

"all that time" amounted to a whopping two hours, a good portion of which was devoted to putting dinner together for my daughter and me. since the only real soreness i felt was in my calves, i took two advil to deal with it. then i impatiently waited the bare minimum for my dinner to partially digest before grabbing my ipod and hitting the streets. i probably would have been better served taking a day off. but i had a good rationalization: wednesday was my teaching day for the spring semester and i wouldn't be home until after nine.

this dilemma repeats itself almost every spring semester, when i usually teach an evening class once a week. on that day my only real option are to run before work or run when i get home. since i can't drag myself outside at 5 a.m. during the winter, i have to run when i get home. i just schedule my recovery day to coincide with my class schedule during that stretch. but, if push comes to shove, i get out and run the miles at 9:30 or later. if i ran tonight, could take tomorrow off without remorse.

i ran the 6 miles, in wet, humid conditions, in 47:14 - a 7:52 pace. the surprise was that it was 30 seconds faster than the 47:45, 7:57 pace from the day before. i was very pleased with the time. actually, i was pleased with the time on both days since these runs are part of what i consider "active recovery." i don't push the effort during these recovery runs, but my legs do benefit from the training effect.

tomorrow, on a non-running related tangent, hope to go see the jack kerouac exhibit at the new york public library. in my typical procrastinating way, realized the exhibit will only be there for another two weeks. kerouac is one of my favorite authors, and this exhibit first opened last fall, so it's about time i got over there to check it out!