A Crappy 6 miler and an Awesome 6 miler

This was a great weekend; we had friends in town for a wedding and bachelorette party.  Not only are they fun friends, but the girl is my running marathon buddy.  We've never run together as she lives in Chicago, but we're on the same training plan and she's planning on running the full with me in October.

After a fun night of debauchery for our friend's bachelorette party on Friday night, we opted to skip the 7am running group run on Saturday morning.  Good call as we got home after 3 am :)  it's just funny since we're all pushing 30 and haven't rocked it out like that since college.

So instead of the hot sweaty run on Saturday, we opted for Sunday morning.  Problem was, we never set a time and just waited for us to get up and figure it out.  This put us out the door at 11am.  85 degrees and humid as hell.  We had 6 on the schedule and headed out, leaving my husband sleeping and hers doing Yoga X.  

It only took 1.5 miles for me to get exhausted.  I was hot, sweaty and felt like crap.  There was no shade and I was dying.  My friend was so awesome and didn't push me too far as she's a much faster runner than I am, but I still was pooped.  I felt really bad stopping to walk, but passing out would have sucked even more.  

After a short walk break, we started going again for another mile or so until I started having cold sweats.  From here on out we ran and walked and cut our run short a bit to finish 5.5 miles.  This was by far the worst I've ever felt running, but it was great to have a friend there to pull me through.  I did point out that she had to walk with me since she didn't know how to get back to my house :)  

After that craptastic run that left me drained all day, I had an awesome 6 miler tonight with my 501 group!  I was almost late to the class which stresses me out like crazy, but I slid in the back door just in time.  We did an out-and-back to total 6 miles in 85+ degree heat.  I did a great job of starting slow and didn't rush myself like I had been doing in the group runs lately.

I found my two friends that I made last week and had a great run!  When I started slowing down and wanted to walk, they helped me through and kept me going.  When they wanted to walk a bit, I helped them push through.  Overall, it was great!  6 miles with stopping for water breaks only.  Awesome run!!

What I like the most is that at the end of the run, everyone was so friendly and chatty and positive, congratulating everyone.  It's like some huge support group and I love it.  It really helps me keep going and stick to my plan.  I had 4 on the plan today and never would have pushed it on my own without the group.  

What a difference two days make :)  I'm finally running out loud!!