So here is a shot of the approximate incline on my hill workout today …

The workout was just as I expected it to be though … rough, but good. I’m pretty beat up now after my long run of 20 on Saturday and then 10 miles of hills today. The above screenshot from gmap pedometer noting the vertical incline .. if I look at it properly, I ran approximately 425 feet uphill over 2 1/2 miles, then came down a little bit and did it all over again. I kind of looped around to hit the hill twice and the second time was brutal, I used the old motivational quote from the movie Rocky IV … “No Pain, No pain”, you know, the scene at the end of the fight prior to the last round. I think they said it somewhere during the training montage also, but its been so long since i’ve seen the movie, I could be wrong. If you’re looking for a motivational movie, thats definitely a good one in my eyes..

Anyway, I about died on the second lap and I can still feel the burn from the workout, but it must have done me some good. I had someone comment on why i’m running hills the way I am when the Ocean Drive marathon is almost perfectly flat (here is a gmap with elevations on, its close to perfect but a little over) .. well, my response is that I didn’t do hills all summer in prep for the Lehigh Valley Health Network marathon which was basically flat, and I suffered because of it in the long run. Not because of the hills, but because i’ve found that the hillwork just helps you in so many other ways. Another reason for the hills right now is because the Flying Pig marathon is just 5 weeks out from the Ocean Drive, and that has plenty of hills, so I don’t want to be behind in training like I was for Baltimore last year.

Thankfully it didn’t rain this morning and it wasn’t too cold, I think I was too focused on the hills to even care about the weather, it really was a good workout. My ab’s are killing me today, even worse than yesterday as I felt my core muscles take over yet again … I could be feeling it better in my abs since I dropped almost 5 pounds since Christmas-time.

One thing that helped (besides my motivational quotes), is having the right music going during the run, which got me to thinking that I should start working on my mp3 playlist for the Ocean Drive marathon. That reminds me, I got an email about two weeks ago which asked whether headphones and mp3 players are allowed at the Ocean Drive. Well, my response was that i’m not the race director, but every year i’ve done the marathon or the 10-miler down there, everyone seems to have them, so take it for what it is. If you’re doing the full marathon though, its VERY lonely after mile 10 when you get off the boardwalk in Wildwood .. trust me. I remember back in 2007 there were points that I went 2-3 miles without seeing anybody at all. Remember that south jersey beach communities are resort towns, and in March, there is NOBODY there… plus I got the feeling that the runners were an inconvenience in the ritzy oceanside developments, so they certainly don’t seem to support you either.

Anyway, tomorrow should be a nice recovery run as the weather is supposed to be warm and wet (we’re talking in the low 40’s in the morning)… I expect to be real sore, but training is supposed to be hard, thats why its training.