I woke up at 6:00 this morning. However, the night before I did not have everything all set out and ready to go so I was fumbling around for a while getting everything I needed together. I got out of the house a 5 or 6 minutes after 6:30. Up until when I left home I had not made up my mind about where to run, I finally chose John Chestnut park/Lansbrook over Starkey Park. Starkey has a great path with lots of water stops but also has some nasty deer flies (they do make you run faster though). Keith and Dixie were going to San Antonio (FL) to do some hills (there aren't many places around here to do them), and I didn't get in touch with David to see when he was running so I was running alone today. The weather was pretty good with 77° temp and 84% humidity to start.
It was almost 7:00 when I got to the parking lot. Little bit of warm up and stretching and then started at 7:03. Today, I borrowed my wife's water belt which holds 2 10 oz bottles instead of mine which holds 2 20 oz bottles. Her's felt lighter and more comfortable, hardly felt like I was wearing it.
Took the first mile really easy at 9:22 (I was worried about my knee although it felt ok this morning). Next mile at 8:29, then 8:24. Stopped at Lake park at 3.4 miles, had a power bar gel and some water. Now I felt warmed up. Next mile at 8:02. Pace naturally picked up - 7:49, 7:35, 7:44, 7:38 .... and on it went. Made 2 more stops, once at east lake hs on the way up and then on the way back again. Now it was starting to get warm and the last few miles were a little bit harder. Last full mile was 7:33 and final 0.6 miles at 7:25. Overall pace (mostly not counting breaks): 7:53 Except for the end, if I saw my pace was 7:45 or 7:50 I resisted the temptation to speed up to hit "marathon pace" and just kept going trying to hold a steady pace. No knee problems today!! Glycerin: 36.3 | 