Jul 23, 2007

running from mosquitos

Sunday morning we all rolled out of bed and somehow managed to get moving to do a 10 mile run (well kyle wanted to go longer). The road that the cabin was on had mile markers so it was prefect. The cabin was at about 19.5 miles so we ran down hill to 18 then back - grab some water/gel/whatever - then out/up to 23 and back for a total of 10 miles. The road seemed like a general uphill climb one way and down the other but really it was rolling hills the whole way. When we got started it was already getting warm and the bugs were out in force.
Once I got going I felt ok - kind of tired and my legs were pretty heavy but not as bad as I though they would. I was mostly glad it was pretty much downhill to the 18 mile marker but then I realized I would have to go back up. Some how I managed to run a sub 9 min mile. The road kind of angled off to the side so I had to run on the right side because my left leg was tightening up from the road falling away off to the left. On the uphill back I had a very hard time keeping my heart rate in control and I had to walk. I figured I would practice what I would do in Canada lol - so I limited my walk time and then run some more. Col asked me how I was doing a couple times and asked if I was in pain or anything and I was not. She ran right behind me for a while which helped motivate me to keep running.
Then there was another up hill and I walked a bit up the hill. Even though I was not running very fast I was always surprised at how quickly the mile markers came and went. At the 22 mile marker Col turned around but since I was not in pain I figured I should run the full 10 miles as planned so I continued on to mile marker 23. On the way back I had to make it through a pack of 5 dogs. Luckily they sort of did there own thing and I was very glad to have my pepper spray just in case. I had to walk a bit up the hills but I finished running and in all it took me 1:39:48 which I'm happy with for a hilly 10 mile route on very tired legs :)

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