I had a fantastic time on the tour, and contrary to my own expectations, I actually got a couple of decent runs in. The most fun was definitely Saturday morning, when Emily and I went running on the beautiful MKT Trail in Columbia. She's almost a year ahead of me in her training, so I started out a little faster than I should have and had to walk for a couple of minutes in the middle, but otherwise we had a nice, easy (for her) 3 mile run. It was fun to run with someone else... although I definitely found out that talking makes running a whole lot harder! Even though it's probably the slowest run that she's had in a while, it was nice to prove to myself that I could run with someone who's significantly ahead of me in speed and endurance.
The trail itself was great. It's a rails-to-trails project trail, so it was nice and flat -- which is boring to some but perfect for slow me -- and there were lots of other people biking, walking, and running. There were streams and bridges and lots of beautiful trees to look at, and we lucked out and had a pretty mild morning to go along with it. It's definitely a route I'd love to run again in the future... maybe minus the walking. Here are some pictures from the trail's website to give you an idea of what it was like:
My runs since I've been back have been okay... I did three miles outdoors on Monday, which was okay but certainly confirmed that running mostly in hilly areas when you're starting out can be a little frustrating. I'm sure it will be good in the long run, but they sure do tire me out fast! Yesterday, I woke up pretty late and didn't feel like braving the heat, so I did my first run indoors on the treadmill. It was a pretty mixed experience. The fact that it was cooler than outside was certainly nice, and with the incline set on 2 instead of 1, it felt more or less like running on the road. On the other hand, running inside is just boring, even with the TV on, and I couldn't stop myself from looking at the distance counter every 15 seconds. The other definite downside was that there was no way to avoid finding out my pace and confirming that I actually AM the slowest runner in the world. It was something of an ego blow to find out that a 13 minute mile is pretty much all I can handle -- I ran 2 miles at that pace, and by the end I was pretty beat. Which means that I probably run even slower on my regular runs. Not so good.
In any case, I know I shouldn't worry about it, and I'm sure I'll keep getting faster with time anyway. Today is a rest day, which is very nice, and then it's back to the races tomorrow -- hopefully culminating in 3.5 on Saturday! Also, I'll be breaking 50 miles since I started running during my run tomorrow morning, which is pretty exciting. It's good to be making progress... even if it is very, very slowly.
