11:14 am
HOLY shit. THAT was interesting.
Five miles pretty much all uphill. And, the downhills hurt more than powering up the uphills because my knees (mostly left–finally, the pain is back where it has been and should be?) hurt a lot going down.
Jesus. They don’t call it “8 Tuff Miles” for nothin’! To give you some idea, at about 5 miles, we reached the highest elevation of the course–999 feet. That means, sea level to 1,000 feet above sea level over the course of 5 miles. Like I said, all uphill.
I have to say–cheesy, but here it comes–powering up those hills (well, one long hill) reminded me a LOT of moving through getting sober! Repeating those moves that just don’t come naturally, like running up a sustained incline for over an hour, over and over until you can actually force yourself to do them! Or, going slow and not stopping, not stopping unless you have to. Breathing into the pain and breathing out–sitting with it (well, moving with it). Bracing for hard work, but knowing that you’ve got this, you’ve practiced your moves, all you have to do is keep going.
My legs felt strong, and that’s because I’ve been practicing this incline shit for a few weeks already. But, dayum! Gotta take a break before I go and pound more on these knees, yes I do.
And…yup, feels pretty darn awesome to have gotten up, gotten my ass over to the course, and run it–all before…8:30, I guess. My time was 1 hour, 5 minutes, 30 seconds. That’s 13-minute miles, which I’m pretty OK with seeing how the course was all uphill and I had to walk some of it and most of the steep downhills.
It’s also awesome to like, not thought it really all that astounding or medal-worthy that I got out of the house before the sun came up. Drinkin’ days? It never happened. EVER. Especially to work out or run a race. Years-never, we’re talking about.
Happy weekend, friends.
Drunky Drunk Girl 