Running Challenge: Day 16-18, a recap

Oh goodness! It’s been a weekend, I’ll tell ‘ya.

Friday: I took the afternoon off of work for no other reason than I needed to use the PTO before the end of the year and I thought having an afternoon to do whatever I pleased sounded perfect. It turned out to be a lovely afternoon! I went for a 6 mile trail run… in the day light! Amazing. I really hate these dark days of winter. It’s tough to maintain motivation when it feels like a challenge to even get out the door. Going for a brisk trail run in the day was a much needed reset after an intense week. But you know, it’s been insanely cold here in Portland. There was a thick layer of frost on the ground even into the afternoon.

Photo by "Patrick D" of Portland

Friday’s run started out so cold, but as I ran up the hill and away from the creek the air got warmer, and so did my legs. Not a bad way to start the weekend, I’d say.

Saturday, the BIG running day: My running friend Eric picked me up at 8AM.  We drove out to Hagg Lake for an epic trail run. Hagg Lake is never super high on my places to go, but both Eric and I will be competing in the Hagg Lake 50K in just a few months. It seems appropriate to do some training runs on the course.

I’m so sad that I didn’t take any photos of the weather or us. It was SO cold. Are you noticing a theme? Thick frost covered just about everything. Our plan was to complete on lap of the lake (14 miles) and if we were feeling awesome, we’d tack on an out-n-back hill climb that would round out our run to 17 miles.  We found a place to park and shivered while we readied our affairs. Once we were all set, we took off down a field and found the single track. The run started out awesome. We were both so full of energy. We chatted about this and that, and kept commenting on the low temperature. It was really cold! Eric had gigantic gloves on in the beginning, big wooly things that I got a big kick out of. Apparently Eric doesn’t like cold hands.

We put in the first 4 or 5 miles in high spirits. Then the trail got harder. We continued our journey around the lake and with every passing mile our chatter decreased. We were just doing one lap, but for the 50k we’ll complete 2 laps. It’s a very big lake and two laps around it seems a bit silly, but that’s what we’ll do.

It seemed like we took forever, but eventually we completed the lap and headed out for the uphill out-n-back. It was lethally steep and a total gut buster. We finished the run in silence, both exhausted and hungry.

We decided to refuel at the McMenamin’s Grand Lodge. Despite the weather, we both agreed that milkshakes were in order.

Yum.

 

Sunday: “Recovery” run with dog! It took a lot of motivation, but we did get the 25 minute run in and we both feel better for it.