Date Run!

Since I was taking today off to go to Sam's daycare's end-of-the-summer party, but the party didn't start until 12:00, I did what any sane person would do: drop the child off at daycare for the morning and go for a run with my husband! Forget about errands or cleaning the house. Or even hanging out with the child :-) Our chances to run together these days are slim, so we decided we'd take today's offering.

After a bit of pre-run stretching and rolling...

...we dropped Sam off at daycare and headed to Bradbury. The plan was to run the mountain side of the BBU course, as Ryan has never been on either the Connector or the course. I was hoping to get in a few extra miles after that, but was going to just play it by ear and see how the 10 miles went. After a bit of a rocky start, due to me being silly about feeling slow and feeling stressed about the miles, we fell into enjoying the Connector and chatting as we ran along. We were both excited to see fallen leaves on the trail - signs of fall! Hurray! It was fun to be taking Ryan on a route I had been on and he hadn't - it's usually the reverse. The woods were nice and quiet, and we steadily made our way up through the Tryon area and out to the road.

We headed up the dirt road to the powerlines, thinking we would just see what happened. It was not signed at the end of the powerlines by the road that the route was closed, so we took that as a good omen and headed out. We ran into a few work trucks just a few yards out, but they let us pass with no issue. When we were nearing the final curve before jumping back on the Connector, we realized they were literally tearing up the road ahead, but were able to jump up into the brush and get up to the trail without much issue. It really looks like they'll be done with the work on that stretch soon - hope so anyway! 

I like the stretch of trail between the powerlines and the field - it's some nice running - and we both enjoyed it. As we headed back up Tryon, we ran into Yana headed down. We stopped to chat for a bit, and realized how sweaty we were! It wasn't all that hot, but it sure was humid! After a few minutes, we each headed our own ways. Through this stretch, we were still moving pretty well, but it was interesting to hear Ryan comment on what a tough route this was. It really does have quite a bit of elevation gain and loss, and certainly isn't going to be a cakewalk for those doing the BBU 50k or 50! I think I felt better overall on all the uphills than Ryan did, with the exception of Lunchbreak at the end. He ran the whole thing, and I stopped for a few walking breaks along the way. He did comment as we were chugging up the Tote Road to the summit that I should stop thinking I'm slow - I was still running fairly strongly most of the way, and I know he was struggling at times to keep up. That being said, I'm in training and he isn't! 

In any event, I was feeling decent, but a b it tired, by the time we got back to the parking lot. In the name of time and energy conservation so I could keep up with Sam all afternoon, I decided to stop at 10 miles with Ryan and call it a day. I'm beating myself up about that a bit now, but I think it was probably a wise decision. After a quick shower, change and a bite to eat, I headed to daycare to spend two hours out in the sun with Sam and all the other crazy kids at her daycare. The staff did a pretty nice job with the party, feeding us all pizza, getting a bounce house, having some little games for the kids to play, etc. Sadly, although Sam was very excited about the bounce house, once she crawled up inside, she could not get up with all the kids bouncing around her, and her eyes widened in terror before she broke out in hysterical crying. Yup, I've got that kid :-) All night, she was saying, "I got in the bounce house and I didn't get up. Then I started to cry. I did not like it." Poor kiddo. But honestly, other than that, she had a great time!

We followed up the party with a stop at the gelato place (yum!) and a visit to the natural food store, where Sam careened through the aisles pushing the miniature shopping cart. After some playtime at home and dinner, she was more than ready for an early bedtime and was asleep by 7:15! I think I'll be heading up soon too :-)

It was a busy, active day, and lots of fun to have the chance to share the trails at the Brad with Ryan this morning and hang out with SamSam this afternoon! Too bad I have to go back to work tomorrow! I think I'll be out tomorrow morning making up those miles that I missed today before I do, though.