Week of March 8th

Maybe it was my wife, or our friends who visited from Maine, or one of my coworkers, or perhaps one of the kids at my son's school.  Maybe I got a little too close to Justin admiring the view from Big Hill.  Wherever it came from, I got sick this week. 

Monday, my body felt generally sore all over, but the weather was outrageous - sunny and 65 degrees!, so I ran with my coworker Dan on our lunch break.  We did our typical 7 miler in Ryan Park.  I was afraid the woods would be crawling with people and their best unleashed friends, but we only had to stop twice for some questionable canines.  What I wasn't happy to see were the three athletes on motorcycles.  Dan and I did not acknowledge their waves to us and we did not move off our line, making them go around us.  I was curious what was going to happen when they caught up with the unleashed angry dog behind us.  What I was happy to see was the blooming forsythia in the parking lot and the snake Dan almost smushed on the trail.  My legs felt lifeless and I told Dan he could leave me behind if he was feeling good.  His pace wasn't too uncomfortable, and I was able to stay with him the whole way.  I actually didn't feel bad at the end.  We did it in a medium pace-ish 53 minutes. 
The weather continued to be spectacular on Tuesday and Wednesday, but I wasn't feel up to running.  By Thursday, I was itching to get back out there and I wanted to go long.  My head still felt clogged, but my body was fresh.  I decided to run the roads to Ryan Park, do the 7 miles of trails, and then run back to the office on roads for a total of 12 miles.  My goal was to run a nice pace, without overdoing it. 
My first two miles I ran in 14:11.  Then I hit the trails and the rain started.  Or so I thought - it actually was freezing rain even though it was 45 degrees out - pretty strange sight.  All was quiet in the woods today and I kept up my pace.  At about the 8 mile mark it started to actually rain and I was getting a little cold as my clothes got wet.  Upon returning to the roads, puddles had formed now, and cars were splashing about.  This and the poor visibility reinforced my disdain for road running.  With about half a mile left, I had to cross a busy intersection and I had horrible timing.  I decided to run up the road and cross when traffic allowed rather than stop and wait.  This took way longer than I wanted, but the anger this caused probably helped me finish strong.  My total time was 1:30:00 for 12 miles - 7:30 minute mile pace.  It felt really good and I know I could go faster if I wanted to. 
I hope to get in one or two more runs this week.  Maybe a Saturday morning run with Justin?