Arg

Yesterday's long run was a disaster, at least in my mind. It started out okay, I was feeling pretty strong and was going along at my usual pace listening to some upbeat songs on my iPod. Having done some pre-planning, I had hidden a bottle of Gatorade and an apple-cinnamon flavored GU at mile 5 knowing I was going to need some additional fuel to help get me through the 12 miles I was hoping for. I stopped for about 2 minutes while I ingested the Gu and drank several mouthfuls of Gatorade then off I went on the second half of the run.

Around mile 7 - 7.5 I started to feel heavy and worn out. It was warmer than I expected (about 63) and I was sweating pretty good too. According to my heart rate monitor my heart rate had also increased a bit even though I had slowed my pace a tiny bit. I drank the last of my water around mile 8.5 and that's also when I started having to walk some of my route. I would walk for a couple minutes then would start running again but I felt reeeeeally heavy and sluggish. I discarded my plan to run 12 miles and headed home at that point which would make it only a 10.5 mile run including my .5 mile cool down.

As soon as I arrived home I drank many ounces of Gatorade and water which tells me that I most likely didn't drink enough while I was out there. (I wear a Nathan fuel belt that has two 10 ounce bottles for fluids). But was that the cause of my sluggishness? Or did I fuel incorrectly before and/or during the run?

I will definitely be searching the Internet for advice from the experts on how I should be fueling my runs in the future. If I want to continue long distance running - which I do - I will definitely need to resolve this issue. And I hope I can do that before my first half marathon scheduled for February 20, 2011. A meer 13 days away......