False Spring Runfessions

It's raining, it's pouring, it's time for runfessions! 

If anyone should 'fess, it should be Mother Nature! Once again, she fooled us winter weary Midwesterners by throwing some beautiful warm days at us. The robins are out in full force. The grass is starting to turn green and the trees have buds on them. Oh, but hold up! Snow is in the forecast. Because yeah, false spring. 

But no matter what the weather, the running goes on. What better distraction from the weather than to runfess? Thank goodness Marcia has opened the runfessional. You know I always have a few things to share. 

Math is Hard

If you've been following my Instagram this week, you already know what the title of this post means. Twice this week, I miscalculated my workouts. This has happened to me before and while I consider myself a reasonably intelligent person, when I'm in the middle of an activity, I cannot do the math. During Tuesday's CrossFit WOD, I incorrectly counted my reps and ended up doing more reps of the activities than I needed to. During my trail run on Wednesday, I didn't plan my route ahead of time, figuring I'd get about 7-8 miles. Well, I ended up with 9.5 miles when I was done. It's fine, but seriously, why is calculating miles or reps so hard during a workout? 

Of course, I turned to everyone's source of expertise, Google, and was surprised at how little I found on the subject. Basically, what I learned is that your ability to perform the workout math declines because the blood flow and your focus are going to the task at hand. The good news is that this is temporary and soon after the activity, your ability to focus is actually better than had you not worked out. 

And really, isn't that what really matters?