30 minutes of steady state, broken down into minute-chunk thought processes that overwhelm my mind. SS usually shouldn’t/isn’t this rough, but it was especially hard today mentally for whatever reason.
Breakdowns
1: you start too fast. settle down, man, you can’t keep this split.
2: ok, you’re settling too much. keep your goal pace
4: one minute to 5!
5: you’re a sixth of the way there… doing good. keep it up
7: you’re one fifth of the way there.
8: two minutes to 10!
9: one minute to 10!
10: a third of the way. doing really good, five minutes until halfway. keep that goal split, I don’t want to see it drop. keep it. KEEP it. KEEP IT.
12: sings along to Ed Sheeran
13: two minutes to halfway!
14: one minute to halfway!
14:30: c’mon, ten more strokes.
15: halfway.
at this point, my optimistic, pushing side says: you’re below your goal pace. let’s keep it that way.
my slacking, lazy side: you’re below your goal pace. you have some space to slow down. how about we keep it at goal pace+3, since we’re 3 under?
(my lazy side usually wins, fyi. talk about not pushing myself)
16: I want to throw up
17: maybe I should do a 20 minute piece
18: maybe I should
19: I should
20: I should stop.
20:01: alright, we’re past the 20 minute mark. let’s bring this up to a 30; I KNOW you love doing a 2×30’ more than doing a 3×20’. Imagine doing three of these, instead of two! you literally do not have the mentality today to do three pieces.
21: I should’ve stopped at 20. I want to throw up
22: 8 more minutes. keep pushing. your splits are moving up; keep it down.
23: two minutes to 25!
24: one minute to 25!
25: maybe I should stop here and do a 2×25’
25:01: I should’ve stopped
26: here we go, four more. that’s less than a hundred strokes. ignore the pain. you’re so close, if you give up now you are a disappointment to humanity
27: KEEP YOUR SPLIT
28: TWO MORE MINUTES, PUSH
28.5: I really should’ve stopped earlier
29: ONE MORE, IGNORE THE PAIN. THERE IS NO PAIN. IT’S ALL IN YOUR HEAD. IT’S ALL IN YOUR HEAD
29:30: it’s not in my head
30:
Then I ended up not doing the second 30’ piece because I did have severe knee pain for the last 10 minutes. Didn’t want to risk it I love any kind of injury excuse that gets me to DNF