The benefits of an early morning run

Yesterday Anne went back to work so I was home with the kids. The plan was for me to get my 9k run in after Anne got home from work. Unfortunately, when 4:30pm rolled around, I just wasn't feeling it, I wanted to stay home and spend time with Anne and the kids, so I bailed on the run.

I had another rest day scheduled on Saturday this week, so I just shifted things a bit. I took the rest day yesterday and then bumped the remainder of my runs up a day.

To ensure I got the run in, this morning I got up early and went to the gym to do the 9k run I had missed yesterday. I was home by 7:30am, in plenty of time for Anne to get to work.

The 9k was another tempo run comprised of a 2k warm-up and a 2k cool-down at 5:15 per km, sandwiched around 5k at 4:15 per km. As I drove to the gym, I became a bit concerned, wondering if  I'd be able to hold that pace for 5k, especially so early in the morning. To my surprise the tempo part of the run was relatively easy.

Sure I was breathing heavy and worked up a good sweat, but it felt comfortable, my legs were strong and I was sure I could keep that pace up for a long time. In fact when the cool-down phase of the run approached, instead of slowing to the scheduled 5:15 pace, I only reduced the speed on the treadmill enough to get to a 4:45 per km pace and held that for a kilometre. Then I ran 500m at a 5 flat pace and slowed to 5:15 for the last 500m.

Although I hadn't had an early morning run in weeks and was a bit slow to get out of bed when the alarm went off at 5:45am, it felt good to get the blood pumping before sunrise. And as I sit here typing this post, I feel energized and ready for the day ahead!