Desert Running

I'm in Phoenix this week so am doing a spot of desert running.

First run was Sunday afternoon, about 2pm. It was pretty hot, low/mid 90s and 8 miles at 8:05 pace was a workout. Not enough water and the dry air dehydrates you real fast.

Monday I ran earlier at about 9am. It was still hot, around 90. Ran 11 miles. The hotel we are staying at is on the edge of the nowhere, so I just ran 5 miles out into nothing, truned around and came back. Great running surfaces, dead flat, but again no water.

Tuesday was tempo day so I went early at 7:45. A little cooler, probably only 80. Only did 4 miles at 6:40 pace, 8.7 miles overall.

This morning I did a couple loops on the 2-3 mile trail that runs by the hotel. Started slow and then went down to tempo pace. 6.5 miles overall at 7:40 average. Will probably do an easy 5-6 this evening.

Thursday should be a midweek 12-13 miler, so I'll probably go early and take some water to avoid dying in the desert and being eaten by vultures.

Short tempo Friday, with probably an easy double in the evening.

Easy 7-10 Saturday and then we fly back to cool California for a 20+ miler on Sunday to give me 80 something for the week.

I'm drinking water/gatorade constantly and am still feeling dehydrataed all the time (of course, the beer/wine probably isn't helping too much). In summary I don't think Phoenix is a very good place for a distance runner except for maybe November-February.