Okay, so the plan for today was to recreate the difficult portion of my 20K AustinFIT behchmark through all the hills. I didn’t have enough time to do the whole thing, so I skipped the segment from RunTex and started out by the rock at the MoPac footbridge. This run should be pretty useful, because next weekend’s 5K has a reputation for being hilly and runs through the same neighborhood. Since it had been quite a while since I’d done hills, I was a little concerned as to how they’d hit me. I didn’t bother to bring my water bottle, because there was a park where I could drink every two miles along the way.

After stretching, I headed out past Deep Eddy and Mangia out towards the boat dock. I did the first mile in a relaxed 9:58 and the second at a 9:45 pace. I then took about five minutes, which was a lot more than I wanted to, but I felt like stretching some more and had to go the bathroom. Let’s just say that I made sure that I was properly hydrated before this run at least. Unfortunately, I also forgot to get anything to drink. Oh, well - I was going to get a drink at Mayfield anyway, just a couple of miles away.

So I headed up North around the lake. This has to be one of the most beautiful runs around. I basically just kept to the left, following the edge of the lake. Of course, there were a ton of hills - including one that I had to rise up onto the balls of my feet to make it up. I kept the pace up pretty well, with a 9:05 first mile. Then Scenic ended at Pecos, and I realized that I didn’t know which way to turn. Hmm. I went up the hill to the right, didn’t see anything familiar, and turned around to go to the other side. That turned out to be the correct way to go, as I came up to 35th street just fine, turned left, and headed into Mayfair Park. The second mile took 10:23 with the confused pause, and the last half mile was at a solid 10:00. At this point, I was getting a little tired of the hills, and more than a little thirsty.

Unfortunately, the remembered water fountain wasn’t there. I took about 5 minutes walking around the park, and could not find one. Alright, this sucked. But at this point, the best thing that I could do was to turn around and head back to the boat dock, where I knew that there was some water. Ah, well.

This time, I was much more consistent. I did a 10:04 followed by a 10:02. That took me through most of the big hills, and I was able to do the last two tenths at an 8:20 pace. Then I was finally able to get a drink :-) Added in a little more stretching, and headed back down Lake Austin Blvd for the last couple of miles to the car. I did those final two a bit faster, at 9:57 and 9:48. Then it was time for a lot of water, and a lot of stretching. I’m feeling pretty good all told though.

Bottom line, it was a whole lot of fun. I’m really looking forward to next week too - my first official training session with Gilbert is on Tuesday, and the Chuy’s 5K is next weekend. Considering that its only 3 miles long, half of which is flat and the other half is a small subset of the hills I just did, I don’t think it will be a big deal.

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