Goals are good, but...

...sometimes you may fall short of your goals.

With every run, I set a goal in terms of total mileage. Most of the time I accomplish the mileage because I have run the total miles many times in the past. But, as my training moves forward, so does my total mileage for a single training run.

My goal for Sunday's was a goal of 30-35 miles. This would surpass my longest training run to date by 3-8 miles. I did not want to do any special preparation. I wanted it to be just another training run. Unfortunately, I fell well short of my goal. I ended up surpassing my previous single training run longest distance by only 1 mile.I ended up with 28 miles on this run.

What do I do when I fall short of a goal? I think about what I could have done differently that would have helped me meet my goal so I can meet my goal in the future. In this case, I thought of several things I could have done differently, without doing any specific preparation for this particular run. By this, I mean there are things I can do overall in terms of diet and rest on an everyday basis and also learn from my approach to a specific distance that I'm attempting for the first time.

In terms of overall diet, I read a very interesting article on your body's natural production of Human Growth Hormone (hGH) and how it impacts your recovery.

In summary, here are the main things you can do to improve hGH production:

• glutamine supplements
• no fat before workouts
• no carbs before bed
• short bursts of high intensity exercise in a fasted state

In terms of my approach to new distances, I am working on my run/walk approach. Here is a great reference for run/walk training and how it affects your overall pace: Walking Breaks

21 Miles run around this loop (boring!):

Post Run (ready for more!):