Giving Blood Has Left Me Feeling Drained

What a stupid joke, huh? Anyway, I didn't run Thursday evening after giving blood. I've donated blood in the past and ran later in the day, but the combination of getting up early, running 15 miles before work, and giving blood left me without much energy. I was only scheduled to run a short recovery run, and I figured I could recover more by resting.

On Friday my schedule called for a twelve mile run, with seven miles at tempo pace (6:40 m/m for me). The good news is that I got the twelve miles in, but there was no way I could do the tempo miles. I ran a mile to warm-up and then tried to hit the tempo pace. I pushed the pace for a third of a mile or so but never did reach the pace I needed. I could tell I was working way too hard, so I slowed down to an easy pace and just worked on getting in the twelve miles. It was still a hard run. I really wanted to stop after eight miles or so.

Today I ran an easy five miles. It had been raining most of the day, so the pavement was wet with a lot of standing water, but it was barely sprinkling by the time I got out.

Tomorrow is my longest scheduled training run ever, 22 miles. After struggling on Friday, I've decided to let my body restore some of the blood I gave away. For the next week, I'm only going to worry about getting in the miles and not stress the pace.