Monday, February 8, 2010

Trail run leads to a spark for the fire

It’s cold. Upper teens low twenty’s as best. It’s a little past 8 in the morning and I’m heading out the door for a run. I don’t want to but I need the training bad. I have a fully loaded double water belt on, I won’t need all the water but want the training of carrying it. I head down the road. I feel tired even though I slept well. It’s been nagging me the past month or so. Is it in my head or is something wrong? No matter what I do overall I always feel tired. If run every day or take a bunch off, I feel the same. It’s something I have found that will I have to look into more. Even going as far as seeing a Dr. sigh…

So I’m running and the back of my legs are tight and sore. …It is another ‘have to do thing’ to add to the list. Calf rises to help strengthen and stretch my legs… But other then that I feel ok. I plug along down the pavement as cars occasionally whip past me with there cold wind. I’m not looking forward to running but it will be nice to get in woods for a bit. After mile plus in I turn right at an intersection, its whole new route today. My running comes to a stop as walk up the paved hill.

As the hills crest I begin to jog again and turn into Fox forest by an orange gate. I begin running on the packed hard lumpy frozen snow down the trail. My running shoes grip the hard snow well enough. There isn’t much give and it’s very uneven. This is going to be a great work out for all the small leg muscle in my legs. But the best part? I’m not far along the trail and I feel great. My calves don’t hurt anymore and I’m enjoying running more then I have in long time. I love then uneven feel under my feet and woods all around me.

Time flies by and as I begin running down a hilly section. The frozen old snow is covered with debris from the hemlock trees. Little cones and bits of needle bunches are every where. It masked the trail in snow. You can’t see it at all. I love it even more, my energy and mood stay high as I continue on.

I can’t wait to run trail more. I feel now how much I have missed it. I can’t wait for my trail race season to begin. I have to get threw my snowshoe race first. I bit off more then I could chew on that I think. I will continue to train hard for it and shall give it everything I got but then it will be back to just running shoes and trails.

I continue on threw the woods on the hard packed trails. I run along frozen-over brooks with water gurgling underneath. I run over small patched of open ground in spots. Some areas are a bit icy and cause the occasional slip. Eventually I make my way to pack to the road and head toward home. Once my feet start to pad softly down the dirt road I feel my energy drop. My legs rebel against the mundane road and my mind is again bored. I struggle to keep going ¼ mile to home. I’m done. I’m excited. I have to do that route more it felt so good!!

I have since checked the miles on this run and have found it to be somewhere around 5 miles. I was shocked. It felt so good during and after. Where as I have been struggling to run 2 miles on the road. At this point I’m even tempted to go again tonight for a night run…

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