Anatomy of an Long Run
In my last post I talked about my great long run on Sunday, and promised to share more details about what made it special. While planning the post, however, I realized that I should make a distinction between doing long runs as part of a training plan, and the type of run I’ve been doing, which I would call more of an “adventure run.” To me, an adventure run is where I get the idea to run a certain route, like from my house to the beach or to explore a new trail. Then I typically spend some time getting my long run up to the required distance and working out the logistics, e.g. figuring out how to get water and working out a drop-off or pickup, if I’m not going to begin or end at my house. My run on Sunday was a point-to-point run on a levee trail which skirts the Everglades. I’ve only explored parts of this trail- the entire trail is a 62 mile loop. I arranged for my husband to drop me off at one entrance point to the levee, and ran from there back to the access point closest to my house, and then home. I estimated the run to be 14 miles and it came out to 14.5- close enough! This was one of the best long runs I’ve ever had, and one of the reasons was that I finally fueled and hydrated properly. My normal routine in the morning is to get up and drink 16 ounces of water with a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar. I do that every morning, and then I get myself out the door is quickly as possible after that to start my run, eating nothing. I know most people eat before long runs, but I’m just not hungry that early. A couple weeks ago, Jessie posted about her pre-long run routine, and said she starts the morning with a glass of water and Nuun. AH! That makes much more sense for a long run day! I also ate an orange right before starting my run. WELL. Those two thing made a huge difference. The third thing that has made a huge difference is carrying water in a hydration vest. In the past I’ve relied on water fountains, or hidden a water bottle along the route, but neither of those things gave me as much water as carrying it in my vest. The vest I have is the Orange Mud HydraQuiver single barrel, and it holds one 24 oz. bottle of water. So here’s how the run played out. 6:30 I was at the starting point on the levee. I had already consumed 16 ounces of water with Nuun, and an orange. My phone said the temperature was 72 degrees, but honestly it felt a little cooler to me. The sun was starting to rise to the east, but I was running south and the sun wasn’t high enough yet to start heating things up. I listened to a podcast about a woman who ran a 240 mile race- I know a lot of people wouldn’t listen to a podcast during a trail run, but as I’ve mentioned, while my trail is beautiful (in its own way) there’s not a lot of varied scenery or terrain. Plus, I love running along while listening to stories of other people running. The first five miles went by easily- I drank water at every mile, and ate my first Gu at around 5.5 miles. It was the Cold Brew Coffee flavor, which has 70 mg of caffeine. Yes, that’s a lot!!! But I absolutely love the kick it gives me. Normally I’ll take one caffeinated gel during a long run, and my preference is the espresso Hammer gel, which has a more reasonable 40 mg of caffeine. The Gu Cold Brew was a special treat. I ran the next five miles on that caffeine high, still feeling great although the sun was high in the sky now. At mile 10 I took my second Gu, which was NOT caffeinated. 70 mg is enough for one run. I also was finishing up my water bottle, but when I got off the trail at around 12 miles, I had another water bottle hidden. (Orange Mud also makes a double barrel version of my vest, with two bottles. Contemplating that for the future!) At this point I had turned east and was heading home- right into the sun. Normally a challenging situation on a Florida morning in May, but there was also a headwind. It would have been super annoying if I had a time goal, but I didn’t so I just leaned into it and enjoyed the breeze. Also at this 12 mile point, where I left the trail and headed home, my podcast had ended and I switched to music. I love listening to music for the last 2-3 miles of a long run- it really gives me some extra energy. After 14.5 miles, I arrived at my house. Of course I was happy to be done running, but I also could have gone farther. I had energy for the entire run and never had to pull out any mental tricks (mantras, step counting, etc.) to get me through it. I know there are people who wouldn’t use gels for a run of this distance, but as I said, my only goal for the day was to enjoy myself. I’m not trying to teach my body to burn fat as fuel or anything like that- I just wanted to keep my energy up the whole time. So there’s the story of my latest “adventure run.” I have another one in mind, but it’s 17-18 miles so I probably should do one more long run in between first, to get up to the distance. Do you do long runs for the fun of it, even if you’re not training for anything? Do you use gels? How often do you take them?