My legs felt surprisingly good when I woke up on Sunday morning. I looked outside my balcony and could see there was light rain. No matter, it was forecasted to be 50 today. This was going to be a great long run. Boy was I wrong. I suited up and then began the long drive to Edwards Ferry for the famed Duel Ferries Run. As we meandered down rolling roads I spied a poor dead fox grotesquely frozen in a large puddle. Its eyes stared hopelessly into mine as our car sped away. I gulped but dismissed this as an omen. The weather was much cooler than I thought and by the time we arrived at the Edwards Ferry parking lot the rain was coming down in sheets. I ditched my pants, zipped up my wind breaker and tried to get my entire body under my baseball cap, then me and 8 other harriers bounded north along the drenched towpath. Melting snow gave way to shin deep puddles and slurping muck making the first 5 miles of our run a morass. Angry that I was cold and wet and that I couldn't get into stride in the sloppy towpath, I began to pick up the pace ever so slightly once we hooked a right onto the very runnable River Road. The pack greeted the pace shift and together we rolled along running 6:30 miles. We crossed paths with Reaves somewhere near "Kansas" and the pace dipped even more. When we returned to our cars we had covered 10. Some grabbed gu and gel in anticipation for another 10. I was hoping to get in 15 so I opted out of grabbing anything to eat/drink. Rather than return to the quagmire that was the towpath, we ran back along River Road. I wanted to jog the last 30+ minutes so I started off behind the pack. Soon the group was well ahead of me. My legs began to feel pretty beat and I was itching to turn around. FINALLY, PMurphy and Dave Burnham turned and departed the pack. I joined them but soon my stride was visibly altered. Something in my quad had tightened and I began to limp. Finally I stopped and started to walk. I ushered Dave and Patrick to go ahead, but they were nice enough to stick with me. We still had a a mile and half to run and the rain wasn't getting any drier nor the temperature warmer. I forced myself to shuffle along only to end up walking again 5 minutes later. Normally I would have walked it in, but the weather conditions were arguably the worst to run in (high 30s/low 40s, steady rain, slight wind), so I really needed to get to a warm/dry place as fast as possible. I decided to pick up the pace and see if that would help. Surprisingly it did, but by the time I got back to the car my leg felt ravaged. At least I was now out of the weather. 15 for the day and 71 for the (down) week.
I met about 15 GRCers at The Line on MLK Day. The weather was quite warm and I ran most of the run in short sleeves, gloves and a hat. I started out easy hoping my legs would warm up...and they did. But after 50 minutes and a number of rolling hills my quad again seized up. I nixed the idea of running 12 and bee-lined it back to The Line along Beach. Another bad run. I went home and took an ice bath on my balcony and dulled away the pain. 10 for the day.
5 comments:
Sounds like sunday was a slam-dunk day for me to get sick.
That weather was tough to deal with. Even though it wasn't that cold, the consistent cold rain and wind fought against the body trying to warm itself. I think sometimes muscles can spazz out a little in weather like that.
That is exactly what I think happened - a spazz.
You had a great run - 21 in that crap (running26.2 pace for 4-5 of it) is really impressive.
No mention of the windshield wiper debacle?
As we drove to the run, my windshield wipers stopped working. Karl and I then had to tie string to each wiper. I would pull one side down...then Karl would pull the other side. It was stupid, yet quite comical. Soon the string broke and we needed to physically throw the wipers left and right.
Sigh
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