Birthday Run

Since this year I was turning 30, I recently got the idea to try to run 30 miles the day after (june 2).  I managed to recover from my plantar fasciitiis that knocked me out of Hells Hills (see previous race report) and got just enough decent running in the previous 3 weeks to feel like I could try.

 

So we started at 0500 running around the fruit loop/trail of beautiful people at Memorial Park.  Except the beautiful people are all smarter than us, and are asleep at this time.  But it was nice running the loop when it was much less crowded, except the thick humidity which was already present.

 

Soon we met with other trail runners and started running the trails at 0600 where the new crew decided to give me ample amounts of sh*t for me, since I presume they are just jealous of my age.  I hope I can be as witty as them when I get to be a ‘senior citizen’ like them 😉  It was fun though, and the miles clicked by pretty well on a warm morning and great trail conditions (the rain has let up just enough the past few weeks in contrast to the first 4 months of the year where the trails have been pretty muddy).  I started feeling pretty rough around mile 15 (the heat was starting to take a toll), and we decided to run the trail of beautiful people (who now had woken up) again so maybe I could regain some mojo.  That area also has a decent breeze and flat terrain, so that definitely was a lift as we finished off 20 miles.

 

My tank was starting to run out, but also time was starting to run out as well.  I had other obligations (Dad’s birthday was June 2 so our family was going out to the Astros game) so I needed enough time to rest for a bit, eat, and such before heading out with them.  To complicate things, some neighbor’s dog the previous night had decided to start barking around midnight, which interrupted my sleep.  So I was already in a big sleep deficit and knew I needed a nap before the rest of the evening.  So at that point, my buddy and I decided to just hike for another 40 minutes to call it even at about 5 hours, and my garmin says we covered 22.3 miles.

So didn’t get 30 miles but the heat was a little to much to cover that in a good pace, and I had other things to attend to, otherwise I could have hiked for another 3 hours (as much fun as that sounds) — but it was more than fine to be done with 22 mi.  Despite the heat it was enjoyable to be able to run (and walk) around for 5 hours w/o much pain and in good company.  But I don’t plan on making a habit out of this — maybe I’ll just run 31k or 31 minutes next year.