Long Walks On Pavement

It was time to do another long walk, and last Thursday, it started with a trip to the grocery store which took me 20 minutes to get there and 20 minutes back. That only covered about 1/4^th of my intended time. After depositing the groceries at home, I resumed the workout. There was no set target this time like when I went up Signal Hill the previous week. More like meandering around the neighborhood. Like before, it was four minutes with aggressive arm swings with a one minute recovery. I don’t know if it was just one of those days, having no target, or the hotter than usual day, but it felt like a boring workout. A couple of lines from Adele’s song “Chasing Pavements” came to mind:

Should I give up,
Or should I just keep chasin' pavements?
Even if it leads nowhere…

My concentration was not very good and the pace wavered, but I kept on until I finally reached my goal of 2 hours and 45 minutes. I was just relieved when it was through. The pace was slower than the 2 ½ hour walk the previous week but the extra 15 minutes brought me closer to my goal half marathon distance.

When my ankles still allowed me to run, I would always go overdistance when training for half marathons. I don’t feel that this is necessary since I’m only walking the Long Beach half marathon this time. I feel that I could walk another 25 minutes and finish the race. There’s one hitch though. When I checked my new work schedule for October, I saw that I was supposed to work on the weekend of the race. Now I have to find someone to cover my shift and I hope one of my coworkers could do it.

Even with the heat last Thursday, I didn’t get drenched with sweat. Perspiration seemed to evaporate as quickly as they came out of my pores. In spite of that, I lost 4 pounds of fluids. When I got home, I rehydrated, iced my ankles, then bound them in braces to control possible swelling. A walking workout nowadays takes 4 to 7 days of recovery for my aching ankles. Ho hum, life’s like that now. Anyway, I managed to cover 11.36 miles in 2 hours and 45 minutes. If you remember, I did a 3 hour easy walk on my birthday (June 2) and covered 11.35 miles.

Oh well, sorry for the dreary post. It’s hard to follow a topic like the Tamarungs of Nangka-Nangka.

Public comments below, private comments: E-mail Me!