Salty War

Just about everybody was up super-early Sunday morning. By 6:30am, at least three sub-5 year olds were up and making noise. Kinda made me glad that I was the first adult to go to bed. Out the door I went, and I was off.

From what I could see from the edge of the subdivision, there was a wide valley east of town. The highway dipped down, then back up to the horizon. On the map, of course, the road had looked flat, but in truth it was best described as "rolling hills". Though even that's not really fair, as the average climb lasted around 10 minutes. Wheee!

My goal was to run for an hour and a half. So I wanted to run out for 45 minutes, then turn around and come back. Half an hour out, I was climbing the hill on the far edge of the "valley", when I passed another runner, coming the other way. The hill was treacherously deceiving. As I crested the steep part, I was chagrined to see that I still had another 600-800m of less-steep uphill, that had been previously hidden from view.

I was running past cattle farms, with bales of hay dotting many of the fields. At the low points, though, were marshes and swamps, and occasionally I'd be bothered by a persistent biting fly.

I hit the top of the second or third crest in ~44:30, which seemed like an ideal time to turn around. I was determined to run the whole way back, without walk breaks. The long downhills were easy and quick. The final uphill, though, was a monster. Right at the bottom, I picked up either a deerfly or a housefly, that spun round and round my head. I picked up the pace, hoping to lose it. Every time I thought I had finally lost it, it would circle my head again, and I would accelerate again. I felt hugely strong, but I kept worrying that there would be a lot more hill around the next corner, and that I was spending myself too soon on the hill. That never happened, though, and I did eventually lose the bug, so I felt a huge sense of accomplishment once I finally crested the last peak.

In fact, I felt so good that I peeked at the watch, looked over at the subdivision, and decided to try to finish with a flourish. I felt like I had a pretty good shot at a negative split, so I kept up my effort. In the end, I was rewarded with a 3 minute negative split.

When we drove out, I measured the run with the car tripometer. 8.3km one way, or 16.6 km in ~1:26. A very respectable time, especially considering the fact that I usually run in very flat areas.

One last note - I signed up for the sprint triathlon this weekend. I have some reservations about the river, but at this point, I'm racing for fun and experience, not pride. Sitting at home next Sunday is no way to reward myself for all the cross-sport training I've been doing.