Running Up Hills

Ed -

So this morning was my long hill day.  I hadn't done this workout in forever, because it's more for building the strength and stamina in long runs and I'd been doing more speed work.  The course I have is a really nice hill just over a mile from my house and it's a steady uphill climb for more than 1000 meters.  The plan was to run out to it, zero the watch, then run up till the 800 signal, hit the lap button and trot back down to the start.  Three repeats.

The run out was nice and right at 8:30 pace. I picked my starting point and set the watch.  I had kind of a cruddy night sleep-wise since work has been sort of stressful lately, but was looking forward to just seeing how this felt to get up this hill a few times.

I hit the start button and moved on up the hill at a little slower than my 5K pace.  The hill starts out with a light slope and steadily rises.  I had gotten about half way up and inhaled a fly.  Or something.

It was a decent sized bug and did not like being in the back of my throat.  I coughed and hacked some right away, but kept on pushing up the hill.  I thought I had swallowed it but felt it up high in the back of my throat sort of behind my nose.  So I sucked in hard through my nose, made some disgusting loud noises and tried to force the thing out with snot.

No dice and it was still moving.

I sucked in through my nose again and this time got some good slime to drive the thing down in my throat and I spit out a huge lugy with the bug in it.  Just then my watch beeped and I hit the Lap button.

3:55.  Not a bad pace for this hill so I decided to try and hit that pace again the second time.

This time breathing through slightly closed mouth and teeth.

Second rep right on 3:55 again and then I pushed the third a little more and hit 3:45.  By the time I got home I had just over 5 miles in and tired legs.  Felt good despite the stupid fly.

Always an adventure.