I Ran, I Bonked, I Recovered

Friday would have been my normal day off, but I had the chance to run with Dora at Bradbury.  We haven't had a chance to run and chat in a quite a while.  She didn't mind a short run so it was a no brainer.  We ran a nice, easy four.  We started on the mountain side, enjoying the scenery, fun footing, and interesting talk.  At the summit, the raptor count was still going on.  We chatted with the bird watcher for a bit before continuing on.  We saved some mileage for the east side so I could report back to the TM group site on the conditions.  From what we saw, the mountainside had the better running.

Saturday I had 24 miles on the schedule.  Most of the Monsters were heading to MA for the Merrimack River Trail Race.  I wasn't sure exactly who would be at the park at 8 am, but I knew who would be there when I was done with around 10 miles; Mindy had volunteered to meet me then to help with my last 14 (the miles on her schedule).  Based on Friday's run with Dora, I decided I didn't want to run all my miles on the trails; it would take just too long.  I decided I'd run an 8+ mile loop on the roads from the park that included some beautiful dirt roads (some of what Mindy and I ran last Saturday), come back and get in a couple of trail miles before meeting up with Mindy.

Turns out, the only TMs to show up at 8 were Erin and Blaine.  They were going to do trails for about 1 1/2 hours.  It almost made me change my plan.  It was very tempting to have the company.  No.  I would stick with my plan.  So I headed off on my own.  I ran well, but allowed stops for photo ops.  There are very cute critters on that loop.  So even though my pace was pretty decent, I was a bit behind where I thought I'd be.  While I was changing into my trail shoes back in the park, Erin and Blaine came in.  Seems the conditions had changed.  The mountain side was now worse than the east side.  They'd just come back in from doing Knights Woods.  I figured Mindy was going to be pulling in before too long, so I went out on Knights Woods to get in around a mile and to judge for myself.  Mindy called just about when I was about to cross the street back to the parking lot to let me know she was there.

Based on what I ran on, we decided to run the trails for 6 or so and then finish up on the road.  Mindy and I enjoyed running through the crazy conditions.  It was very hard to know what the trail was going to yield.  We ended up doing the Scuffle sort of backwards, leaving off the Bat Cave loop from Fox East.  As it was, there were plenty of times where we had to stop to figure out just where the trail went; it was slow going.  Still we had lots of fun, feeling very much like real TMs.

Back in the parking lot, we changed back into road shoes.  With the temperature climbing, the post-holing would just be getting worse.  This way we could really run.  I also changed into shorts and a fresh sports bra and tee.  Mindy kept on her tights, but change into a tee.  I had taken in 2 GUs as planned and packed another for this leg.  I also ate two strips of a PBJ and a couple of pretzels (really just wanted to lick off the salt).

Heading out of the park, our pace was pretty good.  I was anxious to show Mindy all animals I'd seen on my first loop.  As always, I enjoyed our conversation.  I think I might have started feeling rotten much earlier if she hadn't been along.  Around mile 19, I knew I was starting to struggle.  Then we got to stop and meet Zoe, a sweet three-legged dog.  She was 15 years old!  You could tell she was well loved (maybe a little too well-loved by Grandma; Zoe was fat!).

Around mile 21, I started feeling light-headed.  I felt bad.  I guess I never have bonked before.  I've had runs with pain, where I'd been injured, but this really sucked.  My cough is still a problem, too.  The post-nasal drip that had been merely annoying was now making me feel sick.  I think dehydration had thickened it too the point where...yuck.  Around here, I started to walk stretches.  I tried to get Mindy to run ahead.  It looked like she might be a little short of her 14 miles, so I said run ahead and come back...I kinda wanted to have some space (I don't like to be sick in front of people).  We're a good fit!  Once Mindy realized that I might be tossing cookies, she was OK with running ahead (only when she knew that was best for me, too : ).

So that's how the last 1.5 miles went.  I guess now I know what bonking really is.  I will definitely work harder to stay hydrated.  Yikes!  You know it's bad when nothing at E & L's looks good.  I had a cold Coke.  It took a lot more fluids at home before I started to come around.  I was short of my 24 miles by 0.7.  I was surprised by the Garmin when I saw the elevation gain on the run was 3,436.

This morning, I was happy to find that my legs and other parts felt fine.  Still, I was a little worried about my scheduled ten because of how bad I felt yesterday.  Running the road, I'd be done sooner, but if I ran the fields, I could get in my miles without ever being more than a couple of miles (as the crow flies) from the house.  I opted to run the fields and play the distance by ear.

Yay!  I felt pretty good.  The conditions were hard, so the pace was slow.  I decided to aim for what would be 10 mile time on the road.  I got in just over 8 miles.  It was good to know that all I needed was fluids.  I am recovered.