Pavement Pounding - Week of August 27 to September 2

[michelem]

Back to the gym last night for another date with the treadmill (it topped 100 degrees here yesterday, so, for now, I need to run indoors). Didn't do too well. I had gotten a sample gel and decided to try it. Downed the gel and a few gulps of water right before taking off. Launched into a 10 min. mile pace and started feeling nauseous from the get-go. Varied my pace between 6mph and 6.6 mph and percent grade between 0 and 3 and lasted about 5.75 miles. At that point I just couldn't keep going - I had horrendous side-stitches, I started passing gas, and still felt like I was going to puke! So, I ramped down the speed and grade and walked another 1/2 mile or so and called it quits for the night. Bleh. I HAVE to up my mileage and I'm getting worried. At least now I know that gels are not going to work for me. Unfortunately, I haven't figured out anything (even plain water) that works for me while running - the only thing that works is an empty stomach, but that isn't going to cut it once I get much over an hour . . . Any suggestions?

[Jolt]

I was in NJ visiting my family for the past 3 days, and before I left today I went for a run with my younger sister on a MUP in town. I don't know what my problem was today, but that run was awful! After about a mile, I started feeling like I could toss my cookies (turns out my sister was feeling the same way, but neither of us wanted to admit it) and this continued for the rest of the almost 3 miles we did. I also had a heart rate of 200 when I checked it at one point; hers was 190. Maybe it was the heat and humidity, or maybe because I haven't run as much lately (mostly because of the aforementioned heat and humidity--can we please have fall weather soon???). The weird thing was that the path is pretty flat and my usual running routes are not. At least neither of us actually hurled!