Hills are brutal

I ran 10k for time this morning. Most people don't know where Lake Havasu, AZ is and even those who do don't understand the terrain unless they have been here. The only flat areas are down by the lake. Other than that it is uphill to the west (CA side) and uphill on the East (AZ side). I did not want to drive someplace to go for run so I set out from my parent's house. My intention was to have all of the uphill on my run out and have the run back be basically downhill. I pretty much succeeded as the run out was mostly uphill - but there was one steep downhill that I knew I was going to have to run up on the way back. That should not have been a big deal since most of the run back was downhill - but it hit at mile four - ouch!

The run out took slightly over 30 minutes, or five minutes more than a 5k should take me. I was hoping to really shave a lot of time off the second 5k to try to get a good overall time, but my downhill running did not speed up by as much as my uphill running slowed down. I tried to concentrate on having fast turnover on the way down and letting gravity do the work, but my return trip was not a great time. My overall time was 57:27; therefore, my second 5k was about 27:25 - not a great time. My average HR was 160 and my max was 167 so I definately worked the run, just got beat up by the terrain. It was a good run; however, I don't think the time can be used to guage much since the 10ks I have been running back home are much flatter than this.