Furlough day one: trail run

Yesterday I had a much needed break from the city. I drove about 45 minutes north to do my long run on rail trails that stretch some 120 miles up into Pennsylvania. It was a great break for many reasons. For one, my shins were dying to get off of the concrete. It was the first holiday I'd had off for months (thanks shutdown). And of course, it was nice to breathe in some clean air and see some trees. I wasn’t the only one who was excited about nature yesterday. I saw a couple taking pictures of something off the side of the trail. With blatant disregard for social etiquette I  obnoxiously stared at them trying to figure out what they were taking pictures of. It seemed like just a regular tree. Was there something cool in the branches? I thought to myself…is it an eagle, an owl, a dragon? What are they so excited about? And then I realized…it was “foliage”. If I could insert a gif of Deb quotes here, I would. It was basically a tree whose leaves were turning brown and were ever so slightly red-tinged.  I forgot how awesome New England fall is comparatively.

I continued on a half mile past my planned turn-around point. Since it was an out-and-back I managed to convince myself to drop 5 sec per mile for the second 5.5mi of my run. It felt good to keep picking up the pace, and my form felt surprisingly conserved so I was able to work all the way down to 7:45 for my last mile. When I do long runs these days, which is certainly not as often as I should be…I make a point to make them quality miles.  This is probably the biggest change I’ve made (and stuck with) in my post-collegiate career. It’s probably a chicken-egg argument, but it seems that I have my best racing seasons when I’m able to do my long runs averaging 8min miles or faster.

In other news – my parents are still tearing up the racing scene in New England. I can’t even begin to understand how my mom runs so fast these days. She was 2^nd overall female in a 5K, winning $125, and running a 20:20. That’s 6:32 per mile and she’s a 54 year old lady who doesn’t even do speedwork anymore. No that green tinge on my face isn’t jealousy. OK fine it’s jealousy. Seriously, she would be top 10 on the Colby women’s team. Now I really need to make sure I keep up my training or else she will beat me at the Turkey Trot 5k this year!