What the hell was that?

I came home and ran this evening around 1745 hrs. It was 88 with 56% humidity and a 4 mph breeze out of the NNE. The heat index was a little intimidating at 93 but I told myself to start off slow and taper off since this run was supposed to be a test drive for the knee.

I started off at what felt like a relaxed pace but turned out to be an 8:10.23 first mile. I eased up and scolded myself a bit and throughout the next mile made myself slow down when I felt like I was accelerating too much. I had my head up my rear end and didn't hit my mile two split and by the time mile three came up I had covered the previous two miles in 15:53.13 for a three mile time of 24:03.36. I was starting to feel a little warm at this point but since I only had two miles to go, and even if I ditched the run at that point I was going to have to walk two miles home any way I cut it, I figured I'd keep going.

I made myself slow down and thought I might be able to slog my way through the rest of my run without stroking out and I hit mile four in 8:11.44 and a total time of 32:14.80. At that point my wedding ring was feeling tight on my finger and my hands were turning red. I stopped my watch, wiped the sweat from my forehead and started walking home. I couldn't even do that slowly.

I feel pretty good now, the fingers have gone down and I can slip my wedding ring off without grunting and tearing the skin off my knuckle.

One positive from this run is that my knee feels pretty good. There was no pain or soreness and very little stiffness. I don't think I'm going to do any hard running this week leading into the Parade Run and I'm going to keep up with the knee rehab until a few days before Abe's Amble.

Tonight can be chalked up to having my legs rested up and feeling good and not having any common sense to run when it is cooler.