Great trail running

07/25/08
Saturday

For some reason, Friday was a tiring day. Right now I can't think of what I did out of the ordinary to be that way, but I went to bed totally beat. I kept thinking about my commitment to run Bradbury Saturday morning. I kinda promised Mindy I would be there at 6am and at the time I definately planned on it.

I thought about just showing up at 7 am and only running one loop but I really wanted to get in two hours of trail running. What a delema, if only I had an idea of how I would feel in the morning.

I decided to let fate take over. I would go to bed and stop thinking about it and when I woke up in the morning I would see what time it was then decide what to do.
So I half woke up at 5 am, squinting at the clock, I felt tired and beat, there was no way I was going to roll this old body out of bed and I made a mental note to lay my head back down and shoot for the 7am start instead.

Since I was still half asleep, I only felt half guilty about closing my eyes and wasting a good hours run, surely someone else will show up early and run with Mindy.
Besides, I didn't really commit to 6am, I commited to running saturday morning. No matter how my brain rationalized it, I knew I would not be happy with myself for making this half asleep decision. Too late now though as my eyes closed and my brain fell into a dream about something....what I don't remember.

Suddenly, as if the person whose was responsible for wake up calls finally realized they were not living up to their duties, my eye lids were pried open and I was awake.
To my suprise when I looked at the clock, it had only been 10 minutes since I grudgenly (OK, maybe the word should be anxiously?)decided to be lazy and lay my head back down on the pillow.

Isn't the mind odd? merely 10 minutes ago I could hardly force my head up off the pillow and now I was wide awake. I jumped out of bed, got dressed, made a cup of coffee, got all my running things together and hit the road. By 5:45 I was driving toward Bradbury and pretty darn happy about it.

By the time I covered myself in bug repellent, (which I found out later I didn't need), Mindy was tuning into the entrance to Bradbury. I think she recognized me right away because she waved. OK......well maybe she didn't recognize me as much as she saw a person with running attire on an assumed it must be someone that showed up at 6 to run the trails.

I had the pleasure of running with mindy last winter as we were both coming off injuries and running a bit slower than the group. Well actually I was running much slower, lagging is a better term and the running together was during the run back to the parking as we both quit the group after about 4 miles.

I really wasn't looking for a "race pace" run this day and hoped that Mindy was up to something much more casual. We figured we would run the Scuffle loop and be back in time to meet up with the others who were starting at 7:00.

Other than getting pretty wet and muddy, (of course that was expected after a full night of heavy rain), the pace and the run was perfect. We talked pretty constantly and I am sure she is sick of hearing me brag about my kids.

Upon our return to the start, we almost missed the 7am group, I think they started a bit early. Luckily they noticed us coming out of the othere trail and yelled to get our attention.

This group consisted of Ian, Steve and Valerie, we met up and proceded to follow Ian back into the woods. The larger group was fun because we jockied positions a lot which gave us the oppourtunity to talk with different people during the close to 6 mile run.

By the time we finished this loop, I had logged over 10 miles and reached the 2 hour limit I had set upon myself. Now I could scoot back home, get a few laps in the pool for a cooldown and still be able to meet my obligations for the day.

When we reached the parking lot, a new group of runners were ready to join for the mountain side run which I think they planned an additional 9 miles or so. I would have loved to run the Breaker course with them but I had to go.

It seemed to workout fairly well to have approximate 1 hour loops so we could meet with the others at their starting times, yet still run as a group. I guess I have probably said this too many times before but Bradbury is such a great place to run and train.


total trail miles 10.68...1:55:11(10:48pace)
First loop 4.98 miles (11:43 pace)
Second loop 5.69 miles (9:59 pace)