Boulder - Tempo

Time: 49:00
Distance: 8.1
Effort: Moderate
Body: Good
Weather: Mostly sunny & cool


Mid-morning break in the back-to-back meetings/conference calls allowed enough time for a quick tempo run from work, up the Boulder Creek trail to the mouth of Boulder Canyon, then up and over Mapleton Hill and a return through the 'hoods on both sides of Broadway.  Average pace was 6:34 with 1,346 feet of elevation gain for the 7.46 miles of tempo (half-mile c/d).


I was pretty happy with this run. Never felt like I was maxed and could pull out another gear if needed.  


Yesterday was one of those days...left the house with running gear on and got 15 meters from the house, stopped my watch and walked back in. Just didn't want to run. I was fine physically, but mentally just wasn't there. What got me was the realization that I was going to bang out an hour just for the sake of banging it out...no joy...no fun...just rote mileage. On one hand, sometimes you have got to do those runs. After all, it's about consistency, right? Still, at least for me, if there's no joy, no abandon, no "I just want to be out and moving," it's not worth it. Yesterday, it would not have been worth it.


Today was fun.