Well, this was it. I’d been hearing horror stories about the 25K run for the past week from others in the group - that this was the hardest run before the Marathon. Needless to say, this wasn’t exactly appreciated. To top it off, on Friday I think that I dehydrated myself a little too much … but I was feeling pretty good (if nervous) before we headed out.

Got up, took the time to take in a beautiful sunrise. One of the few pleasures about getting up this early on a Saturday, actually. Checked the weather - hmm. I saw that it was barely above freezing, should be 42 at the start of the run, raising up to 55 by 11:00 - my estimated ending time. With no clothing drop available. What the heck should I wear?

I ended up going with shorts (never worn tights), a short-sleeved shirt, and my light jacket, with the intention of wrapping the jacket as soon as it warmed up. I didn’t really care for that idea, but really didn’t want short-sleeves at 42 or long-sleeves for the end of the run. Headed out of the house, remembering to grab my 6-pack of Gu before I left - in fact, I ate one on the way out for breakfast. Mmm… vanilla bean Gu…

Anyway, I get to the meeting late, miss the seminar, but still have time to stretch. Then we gathered around the stage and got the route. It doesn’t sound that bad, but everyone is acting like this is a brutal run, so I’m still a bit concerned.

We head out. Thankfully, we started by going West towards the MoPac footbridge. I spend much of the run chatting to Tanya, who missed us last week and ran the 8 mile by herself. Up along the bank, as we parallel the trail of lights I get to recap our group’s amusement at some of the figures. Over the footbridge, and one of the first things that I notice is that the Unimog is missing. This means I can’t swap my water for PowerAde. Ah, well.

‘Round the bend, then on our way East again. At least we didn’t spend too much time on just the water fountain. Got to the stop just before 35, and I took my second Gu. I’m trying to get in the habit of doing one every four miles, for the marathon. I also take the time to take off my jacket; its getting pretty warm out here already. We kept going past the freeway up towards the dam. This was actually the first time that I’ve been this way North of the river, and its a really pretty trail - much less crowded than the main loop. Very cool!

We crossed over the dam, then headed for the little footbridge under the road and took the dirt trail towards the baseball fields. Instead of turning around like we did before, we kept going until we hit .. um .. some road at the end of the trail. Turned left, and ran up an impressive little hill, followed by an impressive long, slow hill. These really didn’t feel as bad as people had been making them out to be. ACC is on our right, and we pass a waterstop playing Springsteen on the other side of the road.

Up we go to Riverside. At some point on the hill, Rona, Tanya and I had started to distance ourselves from the pack. I feel kind of guilty for doing this, especially since the SockMonkeys really pulled me through last week, but its just an absolutely beautiful day and I want to run! That, and I know that if it wasn’t for them, I’d be doing the slower pace - its good to be pushed sometimes. We’re probably doing a 10:00 or thereabouts.

Crossed the road at Riverside, then headed back towards the waterstop. Once we get there, we wait for the SockMonkeys to catch up with us - a nice couple of minutes of extra rest break. Then we all head off in a bunch, but the three of us end up ahead again somehow. We stayed ahead for the rest of the run. Back to the dam, retracing our steps - its really nice to run on the packed dirt, and much prettier than the sidewalk. Under the bridge, then we turn westbound back towards RunTex on the South side.

For some reason, my left calf starts to ache running up a hill at about mile 13. Not bad, but its cramping just a little. Walking makes it go away, but it soon comes back. Wait a second, mile 13? Whoop! I’m now, once again, further than I ever have been before! Anyway, the closer we get to RunTex the more my calf is bugging me. Everything else feels fine, I’m running completely aerobicaly, lots of energy, but my leg is throbbing. Damn.

Once we get across the freeway, it really starts bugging me. By mile 14.5, I tell the girls to go on ahead and I’m going to take another walk. They do, and I catch up to them when they take their last break, but by this point my whole leg is getting sore. I figure that its because I’m favoring the calf somehow, which throws my run out of whack. If we had 5+ miles to go I’d walk, stretch, massage … but we’ve got less than one. I keep running along.

Now Anthony blows past us! I don’t know where he came from, but this guy is a powerhouse today! Tonya keeps up with him, doing about a 9:45 from the looks of it. Rona sticks at her 10:00 pace, and I’m doing 10:30-10:45 and not having a great time at it. Still, I don’t walk until its over. I’m hurting, but its annoying me more that if this hadn’t happened - probably from the dehydration - I would have had an amazing run.

Made it across the finish line to see those three waiting for me, which is really nice. Immediately stop and stretch! When I ask, it looks like Rona hit 3:00, Tonya/Anthony did about 2:58, and I did about 3:01 or so. That’s close enough to 3:00 to make me pretty durn happy. The others come in, 3-4 at a time. When the last few were back, we saw Minnie and her 10:40s trucking along all in one large group - they’d stayed together the whole run! That’s amazing, considering that she usually ends up losing a couple of packlets along the way.

But anyway, its over. I just ran over 15.5 miles, and other than the calf, which isn’t that bad, I feel great. Loved it. And I’m really looking forward to the Runtex 30K in Buda three weeks from now.

Until next time…

Calories burned: about 2,150
Miles remaining: 174.7

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