Twenty Plus Two Univeristies

20.09 Miles, 2:42:57, 8:06 pace, Avg HR = 141, Max HR = 159

After last week's 18 mile miserable experience, I can't say that I was too excited about tackling 20 miles. And once again I failed to make adequate plans for a long run:
1) I decided to run my long run on a Friday (instead of the scheduled Saturday) at the late hour of about 9PM on Thursday night. I'm toying with running a 10 mile race on Sunday, and I didn't want to run a long run on Saturday and a race on Sunday.
2) Based on the late decision to run my long run today, I didn't carbo load or hyper-hydrate.
3) 20 is still my longest run, so I didn't really give myself enough time to wrap my mind around the task. This shouldn't be important, but it is for me.

But I turned in a good effort, and felt great doing it. I finished strong (last three miles at a 7:35 pace) as compared to last week's collapse. Overall I'm excited because I think I could have tacked on an additional 6 miles TODAY and completed a marathon at an 8:15 pace.

I ran without a route in mind, which is a good thing from a variety perspective. I found Texas Southern University and ran around their track for a mile or two. I took my first water stop there at mile 10. While I was running I had the idea of running at three universities in one run. TSU being one, of course, and Rice being my last leg. My middle leg was supposed to be the University of Houston, but I gave up on finding it after running into two dead end streets. After looking at my route online it turns out I was very close. After giving up on U of H I headed for Hermann Park and Rice and had my second and third water break at mile 15.25 and 16.5. So only three water stops in 20 miles . . . that's running an unplanned route can be a bit troublesome.

Two final notes: I stopped my watch for 1 minute and 24 seconds during the run on my first water break, bringing my overall pace to 8:10 including breaks. My MP3 player died on me at about mile 13, but I was zoned in at that point and it didn't bother me.

8:15, 8:22, 8:16, 8:18, 8:11, 8:16, 8:27, 8:23, 7:57, 8:09,
8:19, 7:57, 8:04, 8:05, 8:08, 8:14, 8:19, 7:38, 7:38, 7:31