High Times

I finally found it today...maybe it was the cooler weather, maybe it was the pasta I ate for dinner last night and lunch today...but I finally found that place where you feel like your feet are not hitting the ground and you could go on forever.

I've been struggling with my running lately and honestly it has seemed like more of a chore than something I love doing. But today changed that. I've read all the theories about runner's high, the endorphins and the adreneline and all that. Please allow me to give you my perception of the runner's high. Running basically involves 3 things...leg turnover, breathing, and heart rate. Sometimes your breathing is too labored for the leg turnover you want to achieve. Sometimes your heart rate is skyrocketing when your lungs seem fine. Maybe your legs feel like rubber even though you're not breathing all that hard. The thing is, there is a special, magical place out there on those roads when, like a finely crafted watch, all the gears synch into place. That is my version of a runner's high. Your heart rate, breathing, and legs are all moving in synch with each other and they find that cadence that makes you feel like you are not really running at all but floating and you feel like you could go on like that for a very long time. Of course, anyone that has pushed their body into the upper reaches of endurance knows that there is a limit to how long you can sustain that runner's high before aches and pains start to creep up on you. But today, it happened for me and it reminded me why I get out there...

Ended up with 6.23 @ 57:41. That's good for a 9:16 pace. I don't know how to pull up my mile splits on my Garmin 305, but I feel that the last mile and a half was probably done at around 8:30 pace.

By the way, my playlist today was the Crash Test Dummies album "God Shuffled His Feet" in its entirety. Not exactly upbeat running music, which makes today's experience all the more abnormal.