Yeah, more power to him. I’m with you. If I can’t get out the door before the sun’s up in the summer, I ain’t running outside. I actually (unintentionally) took most of this summer off and just strength trained and occasionally did some treadmill runs. I lost aerobic fitness, but I feel stronger and like my body can withstand more now. Just have to work up to where I was when I stopped in the spring.

I have no experience with this, but I feel like if you wanted to cut back in the summer, you could maintain your cardiovascular gains by doing other aerobic exercise, like swimming, biking, hiking (although that’s also hot), or exercise in others ways that you enjoy and might not get to do when you’re running more.

UPDATE: I did not die. But I also did not start out at 9:20 pace. I started at 9:40 and finished out the 3 mile tempo at 9:05 pace. It’s not impressive, but I did it. And I can keep improving.

Thank you for your advice.

How can I stay calm/sane during a treadmill tempo run?

I’m in my first quarter of training for another HM. My boyfriend is a much more seasoned runner and is helping me write a training plan. Tomorrow, he has me running my first tempo run (I’ve been doing interval speed workouts for the last few weeks). I’m to do a mile warmup, 3 mile tempo at 9:20 pace (or thereabouts - “comfortably hard,” he said), then 2 miles easy to finish out 6.

I’m almost as nervous as when I ran my first 20 minute block during C25K three years ago. Speed work intimidates me, and I’m worried I’m going to fall apart during the tempo bit.

Y’all got tips on how to survive tempos?

I have a friend who absolutely will not run in the winter. He loves the heat. As in, he’ll go for runs at noon in the middle of the summer. He just won’t run in the winter and will do other things.

I’m in my hometown for Thanksgiving, and I met up with some of my high school friends for lunch.

It was terrible. Two of them brought a kid each, and they spent the entire time talking about themselves and their kids and gossiping about other people with whom we went to school.

I tried to ask open-ended questions about their lives and to contribute to the conversation, but I felt like every time, no one cared about what I had to say.

Overall, the exchange left me feeling drained and frustrated and sad that my friends don’t care about my life are anything beyond gossiping.

I just wanted to vent about it, so thanks for letting me do that.