If I had known what we were in for today, I would have pulled the covers over my head at 5am and gone back to sleep. As it was, I naively got up, looking forward to a nice run with the group. Peggy had mentioned something about a hill up 114th So. she wanted to run, but that didn't really compute. We did some warm-up miles from 5:30-6:00, then it was a run up 114th from State Street to 1300 East. It was pretty much a steady uphill the entire way, until the mother of all hills from 10th East to 1300 East. It was tough. It took me 17 minutes flat to run that about 2 mile route, with an 8:38 avg. pace. Not too bad, I think, for all uphill. Our group has gotten so fast that even though that was a good time for me, I was one of the ones bringing up the rear. Where did all these fast people come from? We then ran from 114th So. to 11000 So. (I think), down to 10th East, back over to 114th So., and then you guessed it, the mother of all hills again. It was just as lovely the second time around. That run took 15:35, avg. pace 8:14. Once again that was a good time for me, but once again, I brought up the rear. It was during this run that I recognized the hill--it's one we ran last year with Steve Ashbaker. I really liked the hill back then, thinking it was a great hill to run up. For some reason, I liked it a lot less this year.
Then it was back down from 1300 East to State St. I ran that in 14:38, avg. of 7:27, which, you guessed it, was a good time for me, but I still brought up the rear. At least that avg. was a lot better than the Suncrest average of 7:58. I knew I could go faster on a more gradual downhill. All in all, I really liked what we did today and would like to try it again.
It's funny, after running Suncrest last week, I wasn't sore at all. Today, on hills a lot less extreme, I was a lot more beat up. My left lower knee hurts and my right shin hurts. I wonder if it's because I went a lot faster today, especially on the downhill? Or maybe it's cumulative, this is soreness that has built up over the last few days? Beats me, just hope I feel better tomorrow so I can get in another fun run. |