Should I have taken the blue pill?

My swimming has continued to improve. After Thursday night's success of improving to 500 continous yards, I couldn't wait to try for more. I was back at the Y Friday after work for my next attempt. However, the past two mornings' runs, especially Friday's 2 hours at 11% incline (>10,000 feet of ascent), and last nights 1500 total yards left me quite tired. My first few laps in the pool were miserable. My legs were really tired and even, for the first time, my upper body was sore from swimming. But I gradually loosened up and was on my way to seeing how long I could last. When I was finished I had completed 1000 yards without stopping. So happy. My race distance later this month is 880 yards (a half mile) so now I feel like I can focus on my technique since now I know that I can swim like an idiot and still make it through the race without having to get pulled out of the water. Of course, this assumes that I'll be ok in an open body of water instead of a pool. Big assumption at this point.

Saturday morning was my final 'challenging' run of the week. My goal was 3 hours on the trails at Fair Hill. Things started off very well. My legs were great considering the 3 hours at incline on the treadmill and 2900 yards of swimming I endured over the previous 48 hours. I was wearing my Garmin GPS in the woods for the first time, too. The forecast was for the temperature to be about 77 degrees when I finished at noon. (This will be important later.) As usual, I got lost in the woods. For about 75 minutes! But, not a problem because the GPS can send me back to my start point at any time. Being lost actually helped me pass the time. But around 2 hours in I really started to tire. Rapidly. I never drink water or replace fluids/calories in any way during any training runs. It almost cost me on Saturday, I think. By 2:30 I was struggling mentally. "Finish the run, its just 30 more minutes. Don't wuss out. Its 10 minutes to the start, then just go past there for 10 minutes and turn around." ----"No. Stop now. You're not thinking straight. Your muscles and breathing are starting to struggle immensely. Go drink that Gatorade you have at the car and go home." ----"You can't quit. This is only half the amount of time you'll be out during the Colorado runs. What were you thinking? Can I still back out? You're not ready to do this. Wimp." ----"Look. There is the car! I'm freaking stopping...if I can make it there." So I stopped at 2:40. Was definitely dizzy and not thinking clearly. I actually sat in the car and wondered if I was alert enough and thinking clearly enough to drive. Turns out I was incredibly dehydrated. Even after consuming the 32 oz of Gatorade (2 pounds), my weight was down to 151.7, about 9 pounds less than when I started. Like I said in an earlier entry, performance will decline when hydration losses equal about 2% of your body weight. 11 pounds lost divided by 160 pounds (I didn't dump during the run to contribute to the weight loss) is almost 7% of my body weight. The temperature was actually 87 degrees F when I finished. I'm sure I was close to suffering some major problems had I continued to run another 30 to 40 minutes.

Once I had time to reflect upon the run later in the day, I considered it a major success. No, I didn't reach my goal time. But, I did push my body probably about as far as I safely could. Still have concerns about whether I can train for this race. At this point though, it would take an injury or something really major to make me turn back. I think about it every morning when the alarm goes off at 5 (or 4:30, or 3:45), but I just can't let myself quit. Plus, it won't be 87 degrees without water stations in CO.