Yesterday afternoon, I started a long-running computer process at work at about 4:00. It wasn't going to be done until sometime after 6:00, so my next action seemed obvious. It was warm outside and the Lake Champlain bike path was calling to me. Apparently, it was calling to everyone, because it was amazingly crowded out there. This 12 miler starts with a mostly downhill mile through Burlington, and after that, it's relatively flat to the turnaround. Last week, I was wearing tights, long sleeves, a wind jacket, gloves, hat, etc. This week - shorts, a short sleeve shirt, and shoes and socks. This was my first run of the year outside in a short sleeve shirt.
I felt good and found myself running a bit faster than last week. My time on the "out" portion was 57 minutes last week and I was at 55:12 this week. Last week, I faded late and did 61 minutes on the return trip. I faded somewhat this week too, mostly because of the last mile going straight uphill. But, my return time was 58:19, good enough for a sub-9:30 pace on this run. Yeah, that's slow, but I was happy with it.
Tonight, I'm driving to NH to spend the night with some friends. Tomorrow morning, we'll drive south of Boston and meet some other runners for a training run on the 50K race course I'll run in 2 weeks. Most of the runners are planning to do the entire course, but I'll probably go a bit less. Unless I feel really good, that is. I'm guessing I'll do 25-26 total. Hopefully, the weather will be kind to us, but it looks a bit iffy right now.
If I get through tomorrow's run OK, I'll have somewhere between 45 and 50 miles for the week, my highest of the year so far.
Good luck to all the Umstead and AR50 runners out there, especially Smokin' Joe who is going to get his first 100 mile finish in NC this weekend.
2 comments:
that brought back some memories, so I went to GoogleMaps; yes, that was the Winooski that the bike path dead-ends into at the north end.
I'd never thought about it, but suddenly realized that it had to be.
Have fun on the 50K practice run.
Except, the path doesn't end at the Winooski any more. They put a bridge across the river about 5 years ago, so you can now run much more, including getting out onto the causeway, where you've got the lake on either side of you. That makes for an awesome 20+ miler from downtown.
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