20K

This morning I was to do 20K. I got up early to do it so I could get back home and watch the live webcast of the National 20K racewalks in Eugene, Oregon this morning, starting at 8 am our time (7 am in Eugene). My friends Erin and Dave Talcott are both racing this morning! It's rare for me to be able to watch live racewalking events, so I'm really enjoying this.

Back to my own 20K :). The weather this morning was quite nice at 63F (17C) with a bit of a cooling breeze. I still got very warm, as I'm not adequately adjusted to any sort of heat - yet - I will be working on that. But not for 20K. Anyway, in general I felt very good today. My legs felt good for the whole thing; I was much less tired than I've been on recent longer walks. I think my endurance is starting to come back, though it's definitely not 100% yet. Time is short, but all I can do is continue to work hard and see what happens.

I stopped very briefly at 10K and 15K to eat Clif Shot blocks; the package was hard to open (note to self: put in ziploc next time so I don't have to stop) and then a bit after 15K to refill my water bottles. The worse part today was the serious GI distress I had starting about 14K. I had to stop at 16K to use the restroom and then I was fine through 20K. I did take my Imodium last night and this morning, but for some reason it wasn't good enough. Frustrating. I might have eaten too much last night at dinner? I went out with Loren, and tried to take it easy, but maybe it was too much?

Anyway, other than that, it was a great walk. Total time 2:05:04 for 6:15/km with ave HR of 146. 5K splits were good too, at 31:14, 31:24 (1:02:38), 31:00 (1:33:38), 31:26 (2:05:04). Nice and consistent! Finally, my shin was totally fine! I'm icing it just to be safe, but it felt good. Whew. I was a bit worried about it. I have a cross-training day tomorrow before my 10K kickdwon on Tuesday, so hopefully it will stay OK.