On the outside looking in again?

Another sub-par run has me wondering if I've peaked too early and am now on the outside of 3:15 looking in. How can I be the guy who easily did 17 w/ 13 @ 7:14 pace a few weeks ago?

Today, according to my Garmin, I did 13.4 and the last 2.5 in which I attempted to run at marathon pace were 7:32/165, 7:26/169, and 3:47 (7:34)/170. What the hell? When I did my MP pace run three weeks ago, my last three miles (after running 10 at MP!) were 7:10/169, 7:04/167, and 7:06/168.

Arrrrrrrrrrrgggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhh. My excuses -- which do not app up 20 to 30 secs/mile -- are that

• my Garmin doesn't seem to be completely accurate on the trail. The conventional wisdom is that it's 4.6 miles around, but my Garmin reads 4.5 per last lap. [A friend road a calibrated bike around and got 4.57. Another guy claims a cross country team wheeled it at 4.60.] That's a 1.5-2 % difference, which doesn't seem like much, but that's 7-9 secs at 7:30 pace.
• it was pretty windy. Sustained 15-20 and gusting to 25-30 mph. It wasn't really in my face the whole time, but since it was from the WNW and since my half lap at MP took me from the east to the west side of the like, I guess it was net in my face.
• it was 27 degrees. Cold is better than hot, but I recognize that at some point, you do lose something when it's cold. I was wearing two shirts, tights, and a water bottle holder. It was in the 50s and very low humidity on the previous MP run.

After going through the excuses, I feel a *little* better, but still not happy. Blech. I'll have another track workout between now and the marathon. Hopefully that will lift my spirits.

I think I'll do 5 miles easy tomorrow, which will just get me to 50 for the week. It's been a long time since I've seen a number that low.

The hip definitely took a hit from the 13 miles today, but on average it seems to be improving. Balancing the miles to keep fit while getting healthy is definitely tough.