Running in the Rain

It finally happened!  The heat has broken!  The rain started this morning and our high today is only supposed to get to 89.  And the rest of this week is only low 90s with lows in low 70s, if you can believe that.  It's lovely!

I ran home from camp this morning and was shocked by the difference.  It was raining when I started running.  My hubby had taken my hat when he left with my weights and my mat (my bad for not telling him to leave it), so I might have run a bit faster anyway since there was rain in my face, but Joy and I ran the first mile more than 30 seconds faster than the first mile in several weeks.  It felt effortless.  She u-turned and I ran toward home.  I got to my exit on the trail and decided it felt so good I wanted to keep going, so I ran an extra half mile up, and then doubled back.  It just felt that good out there this morning.  But I didn't get to walk with my neighbor after my run.  It was raining pretty steadily by the time I got home and it turned into a downpour shortly after that.  I was completely soaked.  So glad I wore my camp shoes instead of my new ones.  It's always a tough call for me on Wednesdays.  I should do what Joy does -- wear camp shoes and then change into running shoes, but that's tough on days my hubby has to go to work so he leaves early with my mat and gear. 

Anyway, it's funny that I added on the extra mile this morning b/c I'd thought about adding a mile anyway to several runs over the next few days to combat the vast quantities of cake I hope to consume in the next week.  It worked out well -- it felt so great to run that I wanted to keep going, and I wanted to run extra so I will be comfy in my clothes next week, post-cake.  But the funniest part of all this is that I was reading one of my fave blogs at lunch, Half of Jess, and she had a post today about calorie-counting being easily obsessive and suggesting it's not good/healthy to go to the gym for 2 hours to burn off extra calories you eat.  Oops! 

I've never been a calorie counter; while I'd like to lose some pounds, my main goal right now is really doing well at MTCM (in LESS THAN SIX WEEKS!!!!!).  I have a vague sense that people are supposed to eat about 2000 per day (I think from the RDAs on things?  actually not sure where I got that number), but my fave blogger (and one of the two I've read the longest), Bella on the Beach (n/k/a in Lapband Land), eats 1200 per day.  I guess it is different for everyone and depends a lot on whether you're trying to lose weight, trying to train for a BQ-marathon time, what you currently weigh, or whatever.  But  I don't really have a sense of how many calories are in things.  I'm eating an asian pear right now and don't have a clue -- 200 calories?  I eat frozen meals for lunch pretty often, usually Amy's brand, and I think those are about 400 calories each, which makes sense because that's about 1/5 of the daily total as I imagine it, and so 3 meals then would be about 1200, plus 800 calories of extra veggies or snacks or fruits or whatever.  It seems like most things I eat other than lunches don't specify calories so it's hard to tell. 

I'm super-excited about running tomorrow now.  Schedule is 2 easy, 2 race pace, 2 half pace, and then 2 easy.  If we'd had to do that last week, it would have felt like a beat-down, but race pace will hopefully feel like a piece of (birthday!) cake in the temps tomorrow morning.  Half pace will be tougher of course, but less so with 10 fewer degrees.  I have a feeling I'll be running solo a lot tomorrow when the guys pick it up... oh well!