"The day that I ran out of road"
I have been doing the same long run route for the last couple years. I absolutely love the route because I get a lot of variation in scenery, on most of it there's minimal traffic, and its really really pretty out by the lake. The other good thing about it was that I felt like no matter how long my scheduled run was, I could just keep running and running on this particular road until I needed to turn around and head home. It never occurred to me that I would eventually reach the end of the road.
Last night, I did. I got to the stop sign where the dam (yes "dam", not "damn") road meets up with a sort of busy road and thought to myself "well ... where do I go from here?". I was only 1:20 into my three hour run, so I needed an extra 10 minutes or so. I ended up taking an alternate route home that added a few miles to the out and back.
For the first few hours I felt AWESOME. For me there is NOTHING better than the way that middle hour of a long run feels on a good day. I was totally in the groove and just coasting along - felt like I could keep running forever. Unfortunately on my way back up to my apartment, in the last half hour or so, I developed a nasty side cramp that slowed me to a walk, and NOTHING would make it go away. I'd walk for a few minutes and it would feel better and as soon as I would start running it would come back. It was the kind of cramp that makes breathing just excruciatingly painful. I don't know what the deal was, but it was a little frustrating. My lower back is a little sore today one one side, don't know what the deal was, or if its related, but its all just a little weird. The back thing could be from my horrid posture and position when I'm sitting on the couch working on papers (which I did all day yesterday). I dunno. I'm sure I'll live.
A few things happened yesterday to keep the run interesting. When I was out on the dam I was passed by a pack of riders from a local cycling team, all wearing matching kits, except one. This dude caught my eye because he was wearing one of the jerseys awarded to the winners at collegiate nationals. I right away recognized him as the dude that won the crit (he doesn't go to Looneyville U. - he goes to the other big state University - but he must have been in town for some reason). At the race on Sunday a friend of mine who has raced with him all year said he doesn't have all that much natural talent, but he "can suffer better than anyone I've ever met". It was cool to see him out riding in his national champ jersey, obviously proud of his accomplishment. The same team was out last week when I was running doing loops on the dam - they must have passed me five times. Yesterday I was hoping they would come back around so that I could congratulate him, but no such luck.
The second exciting thing happened about 2:20 into my run, when I was getting ready to come off the bike path. It was getting dark and I was starting to get a little fuzzy. This time of year you see lots of snakes on the bike path if you're out just before the sun goes all the way down. The first few that I saw were all pretty small (including a little ringneck that I wanted to pick up and bring home!) and then, just as it was starting to get REALLY close to being dark, I saw what I first thought was a beautiful cornsnake laying in the middle of the path. We have lots of cornsnakes, but I never see them. I walked right up to this guy to take a look and then realized that ain't no cornsnake. I've seen a million copperheads in my life, we have LOTS of them around here - I can't believe I thought this one was something else! I blame it on it being damn near dark and my being a little fuzzy from the run. Copperheads usually don't bother me too much, I just give them some room and go right on by. But when I trotted right up to this one to give it a good look, it reared up in strike position, and was not happy again afterwards. So there I was on the bike path, in the dark, with this pissed off poisonous snake sitting right in the middle of the path. I stood there for a few minutes wondering how in the hell I was going to get around him (he stayed in strike position the whole time) until finally I said oh what the hell, and tiptoed around. I guess its really not all that exciting, but it certainly brought me out of my long run zen mode!
Anyway, side cramps notwithstanding, it was an awesome long run for me. Definitely the longest training run I've ever done. Was I REALLY considering pulling out of the race a couple days ago?? No way in hell I'm doing that!
Posted by gator at May 18, 2006 11:30 AM