A Good Week But Not Super Specific

Started off the week with a run with Amy G. on Tuesday morning. It was overcast and rather cold and damp out, and not feeling very spring-like, frankly, but nice as always to have a friend along for a morning run! We ran along the new connector path and into the Highlands, where we detoured down into the ravine to run the trails that flank the stream's edge. It was fun to get in a short stretch of trail in amongst our urban exploration and I was pleasantly surprised to find the trails much drier than I had anticipated! (8.5 miles)

Wednesday morning, I ran the cart paths plus the lollypop down to the river and back. Another chilly morning but there was sunshine at least! Lots of birds calling, woodpeckers pecking, ten deer seen, one great blue heron flying out of one of the swampy areas near hole #8 and four hawks flying overhead. The woods are greening very slowly it seems, with only some furled up greens of the false lily of the valley showing and no wildflowers blooming this morning, at least not along my route. Felt a bit tired this morning, but happy to get in the miles. (8.0 miles)

Excited to pick up the new Nike Wildhorse 5 at Fleet Feet on the way home Wednesday night and to test them out on Thursday's run. It was another rainy, raw morning on Thursday and I just plain did.not.want. So I didn't. Instead I left work a bit early and ran before picking Sam up in the afternoon. Still a bit chilly out but not raining at least! Ran Highland Green Road, threw in a lollypop down to the river and added on Canam at the end. With the back dirt road, it was probably about half and half dirt and pavement. The shoes felt pretty good! And very bright and colorful! 🌈 (7.0 miles)

I am feeling a bit anxious about Wapack. It's going to be a long day with a lot of hills and technical terrain. Eeekkk! 😱 With that in mind, I have gone back and forth about how to handle this week leading up to the race. Originally, I had this as a semi-taper week, then I changed my mind and thought I'd try for another "up" week with a long run on Friday, and then frankly when I woke up on Friday morning, I was feeling anxious about that decision, wondering whether it was wise, and eventually just crawled back into bed and fell back to sleep for a bit. I took that as a sign that a semi-taper week was the right decision, and I felt much lighter once I had decided that! But, I had already planned to meet Anne for some miles at Brad, so I texted her to let her know I was not planning on a long run and that given that, I was thinking of just running from home. I asked her, as a long shot, if she wanted to come up here and run out in the Cathance with me instead, and she did, so YAY! Such fun to show her my home trails and we had a great time chatting away as we ran. Still not a lot of greening in the woods, but we did see a few small patches of trailing arbutus, and the river was flowing nicely! Found out it was her birthday too, when she mentioned it rather off-handedly about 8 miles in the run, so I felt honored she chose to spend the morning out in the woods running trails with me 😊 (10.5 miles)

The rest of the day was spent baking and cleaning and packing and doing a few errands before picking Sam up at school so we could head up to Jamie and Kate's for the weekend! Always good to see those guys and of course, Sam was so excited to hang out with Moxie and Hagrid and all the kitties! We had pizza for dinner and then drove over to the brewery for trivia night and darts 😀 Always a good way to kick off the weekend!

Saturday was filled with lots of doggie snuggles and time spent helping Jamie and Kate get things are ready for the race. Ryan and Jamie took off in the truck to mark the marathon course while I cut oranges and labeled race bibs while Kate got the start list all set and things printed out for the volunteers, and then we sat and got the awards all set. Then a bit of relaxation, dinner and early to bed for all of us!

This morning, Jamie, Kate and Ryan were off to the brewery early, as the marathon starts at 7:00 am. I was sad to be missing it this year, as last year was such a blast and it's such a cool course, but it really just didn't fit into my schedule with Wapack next Saturday, so the 10k it was! Which meant I didn't have to start running until 11:15 am. Sam wanted to drive out on the marathon course with Jamie again this year as the roving aid station, so I had the house to myself for bit before I made my way over to the brewery around 8:45 am. It was a nice relaxing way to start a race day!

Things were pretty quiet when I arrived so while we waited for registration to open, I helped Kate write the dates on all the finisher awards and then once people started arriving, manned the race day registration table. It was bright and sunny and warming up by the time Ryan ran in at 10:30am, defending his win from last year with an even faster time this year! Woohoo!! Steve Day finished up in 2nd, coming in right before the 5k started, just like me last year. He got some good cheers for that 😀

I did a short warm-up back to Jamie and Kate's house to use the bathroom and pick up Ryan's protein shake, and then continued on for a bit before heading to the start line. (1.0 warm-up)

Airline TrAle 10k
I had no idea how this race would go. I figured I might as well "race" it but given that I haven't raced anything short in years, I had no idea what racing would actually comprise of 😂 I lined up close to the start and figured I might as well use the fact that I knew the course to my advantage and work the paved downhill at the start, if nothing else, for training's sake! I saw one woman shoot out far ahead and knew she was gone; the two others who were a bit ahead of me, I was hoping I could gain on, but who knew? After the 5k turn-around, as the road wound upwards and got a bit more rugged, I passed the girl in 3rd and as I didn't want her to pass me back, I ran pretty hard up to the turn-around. It was so warm out that I actually did stop and take a swig of water before turning around and running back downhill. I knew the woman I had passed wasn't too far back so I worked it as much as I could on the uneven downhill, avoiding those still making their way up to the turn-around, and kept the pace up once I hit the flats.

As I crossed the river with a little less than a mile to go, I could see her a ways back and figured I could hold her off assuming I could drag myself up Tannery Terror at a quick trot! I also saw Michael Wade not that far ahead and made a bid to catch up with him. If the race had been longer, I think I might have gotten him as I gained about 40 seconds on him going up that hill based on the Strava segment, but in the end, he got to the finish line first. Still, between him and the 4th place woman behind me, I certainly had reason to keep up the chase!

Man, these shorter races hurt 😂😂 My watch read 5.88 miles, so a bit shy of 10k but happy to have come in 3rd woman and support a good cause and our friends along the way! (5.88 miles)

RESULTS
49:20
3rd woman
9/50 overall

*I like the per mile pace on the results page, but since the race was short, it was more like 8:23 per mile (per Strava) 😉

We hung out for a while at the brewery, enjoying our free beer and chatting with friends before making our way back to Jamie and Kate's house for a late lunch before we headed back home. As always, so great to see those guys and we had such a fun weekend!! Thanks, Jamie and Kate! 💗💗

So all told, a decent week of running although with nothing truly specific to Wapack or Western State training. I know specificity is important and I will be hitting the hills pretty hard after Wapack recovery for the final block of WSer training, but sometimes it's fun to just run with friends and enjoy yourself too 💗