San Diego Training Week: Day 3

Today's plan was for an open water swim followed by a run. I haven't been able to kick this cold and was feeling crappy but I had to get out and try to get something done. I grabbed my wetsuit and running gear and headed for water. I wanted to swim in Mission Bay where I've swam before during the Mission Bay Triathlons and figured this would let me avoid the ocean coast and waves and tides. When I got there though they had posted No Swimming signs. Apparently the rain during the week had stirred up "stuff" so swimming was a no-no. Ok, well I decided to head to the coast and see what the situation was there. I drove to La Jolla Cove and it wasn't pretty, the wind was pretty hefty and the water seemed angry. The waves and breakers looked pretty nasty and swimming alone and not being familiar with rough water swimming I wasn't about to chance getting out there. So it was going to be just a run. I got my running gear on and was hoping to get 10 km in but I'd have to see how I felt. I started running north along the cliff overlooking the cove towards the town of La Jolla. I really didn't feel great and the best I could do was maintain a 6:00 pace. And this was on a slight downhill. I ran past the cove and hit a steep uphill into La Jolla which I did slowly and then continued through the town and on to Torrey Pines Rd. which was a long descent down to La Jolla Shores. All I could think about was that I'd be climbing this on my return. I got down to the shores, a long beach, and ran to the end where I had to take a break. I was at 4 km and with the exception of a short uphill the run so far was all downhill. Not good. I took a short break and started back and it wasn't as bad as I'd expected. I made it all the way back up to the cove and had a 5:50 pace for the 8 km run but at this point I had to just be happy with what I could do.