I did part one of my hard weekend today. Took the afternoon off work and used a half-day PTO so I could make sure to spend Saturday with my family. I started my ride around 1 and went up toward Auburn and did some good climbing. I did my normal loop in reverse and went up Auburn-Folsom and back down Indian Hill and back through Newcastle. Covered about 37 miles in 2 hours prior to my long run.
Then I made it back to the car, locked up my bike, changed my shoes and was off on my 22 miler. I decided to do 2 out-and-backs so I could come back to the car halfway through and switch my 2nd bottle from Gatorade to Coke. So I went off on the North side of Lake Natoma first all the way down to Hazel (almost). First 30 minutes were supposed to be easy and the next 30 were supposed to be slightly harder effort. My HR was particularly high because of the heat I think so on my pickup pace, it was in the low 160s which is really high for this kind of run. I managed OK though. But boy was it hot! When I started I think it was about 90 degrees. Plus the North side does not have a lot of water options and by the time I got all the way back to the drinking fountain, I was already dehydrated. After the 30 minute pickup I slowed down for 10 minutes and started another one. I made it back to the car before the 20 minute pickup was over though so I switched out my Gatorade for Coke and kept on going, trying not to take too long. My first out and back was about 1:24 or so because of the tempo pacing. Unfortunately, I did not have enough ice and the car was really hot so everything in the cooler was melted. I drank some of the cold water out of the cooler (I know, kind of gross, but it tasted good) and went out on my way.
The 2nd out and back was on the South side of the lake. I started at the slightly higher pace to finish off the 20 min pickup and then recovered for another 10 minutes after that. Finally, had one more 10 minute pickup. I was still feeling OK, but the heat was getting to me since I had no ice and was only able to drink warm water and luke-warm coke. I still hung tough though and chugged along. Got to the 2nd turnaround at about 2:08 and that was about 16.5 miles. On the way back I filled up my water at Nimbus flat so that was nice. It was still warm, but I could at least keep drinking. The coke works well although this time since I didn't have any ice, it went a little faster and was kind of fizzy in my bottle. I stuck to my gels every hour and did my final one at 2:30. With about 3 miles to go I was still motoring along. Pretty slow, but a decent, steady effort. My legs were doing OK, but my energy level was a tad low. I think the gel helped a little and the last 25 minutes were not horrible. It was a really, really, long run, but I finished. I was really dehydrated at the end and was dying of thirst, so I went to the Circle K and bought 2 32 oz Gatorades and a chocolate milk with my bags of ice for the ice bath. And boy did that Gatorade taste good!!! It was a solid workout and I seem to be able to hold about 8 minute miles or better on these long, tough runs after 40 mile rides. I am thinking I may shoot for about a 3:30 marathon split if I am feeling good off the bike in L'ville. Who knows what the day will bring, though...
Tomorrow is off - spending time with the family. And Sunday is a 110 miler with a ton of climbing - should be about 10k feet or so. I am feeling fairly confident at this point, but I may feel differently 6 hours into that ride.
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