Falling Behind

I just poured myself a coffee and am not getting up till I get last week's runs down. Thursday and Friday I did a total of 10 miles in the fields. They are usually hard miles just because of the terrain. Also, I ran before the rain on Thursday so also had the heat to contend with. The nice thing about the fields (besides being able to start running as soon as I'm out the door) is I'm almost always rewarded with some wild life encounter.

Thursday I found out which tree the hawk couple has its nest in. One of them flew screeching in to the tree with a fairly large rodent dangling limp from its claws. Almost immediately, its mate took wing. They must still be feeding babies. I wonder when they'll fly the nest. Then I saw my turtle log. It was overflowing with turtles!

Friday's run, I saw two mom turkeys with their broods intermingled trying to avoid my interest. The turkeys have been very prolific this year.

Saturday Rick and I headed to Bradbury. When we got to the parking lot, a group of runners had already started gathering; none of them looked familiar. We did find Steve Day there a bit a part from the others. We chatted with Steve a bit, expecting to see Blaine and Erin and Chuck to be pulling in. The group of four other guys sorted of gathered at our car. Hmmm....I said something about not recognizing anyone, although one person looked familiar and sported an Inov8 hat. He said he recognized me. Sorry, Nate!

It seemed like it was time to get going. I was the only one that knew the course. So. I think I apologized that I wouldn't be going at a good enough pace (it was obvious just looking at the crew). Then Blaine and Erin pulled in! Whew! I was relieved. Mary showed up soon after. We waited a couple more minutes and then we were off.

Some how I was still the lead person. I wanted to go fast enough, but... somewhere short of four miles (on some wider part of the trail), I dropped back and asked Blaine to take the lead. He was more than happy to; after a fall he would be glad to see further down the trail than just the feet ahead of him. Bye! For a while, it was just Rick and I, but then we picked up Martin who didn't stay with the faster group.

Around 6.5 Rick decided to drop back more and told me to do my own pace. He was having ankle and achille issues. So I chatted Martin's ear off the rest of the Bruiser. He'd never done the race before and had only run at Bradbury one other time. I played tour guide and pointed out all my landmarks for miles.

I felt like I was pushing the pace on the O trail, but, the time didn't really reflect it. O well! It is sort of a Twilight Zone place. One pretty bad ankle twist near the end almost had me walking, but I know it's better to keep moving and ice it later. The worst part was wrenching the other knee when I was catching myself. Again, oh well, there'd be lots of icing that afternoon!

We chatted with the other runners who'd stayed in the lot after they finished. Another good day at Bradbury!

Sunday, I was dreading my run a bit because I was doing the shadeless fields and had waited till 11 a.m. to get going. It was already 86. Hot, yes, but a wonderful breeze had picked up. The humidity hadn't built in yet. I enjoyed my 4.5 way more than I thought.

It won't be long now before I am getting shots of adrenaline running the fields...I know from previous years that the snakes like to start sunning themselves out there. Almost stepping on a snake really makes the heart pound.

I apologize, but I'm not proofing this post.