After a good 15 minutes of very slow running up the first long, slow haul on South Mesa Trail, I got to the cutoff to Shadow Canyon to find that the whole area was closed on account of breeding raptors. Discouraged and a bit annoyed by this at first, it may have ended up being a blessing in disguise: even without the climb up South Boulder, I probably put more climbing in today than I have in the past month of running around Westminster and on the Creek path.
I ended up going much farther than I anticipated, hitting one of my normal turnaround points when coming from the other direction and heading back for a good eight mile loop. That puts me a bit over 22 for the week. With a decent run tomorrow, I should easily hit my 26 mile goal, assuming I don't suffer any ill effects from the run today.
Suffice to say it was wonderful to get back on some honest trails today. For those who haven't been there, the south Mesa trail starts on a long, gradual uphill smooth enough to drive a Honda Civic up if you wanted to and it weren't several forms of illegal. Around two miles (maybe?) in, the trail evolves into double track, and then some rather gnarly track-and-a-half. If I had taken my camera along today, I'd show a picture to demonstrate. I soon found myself wishing for actual trail running shoes, as my Brooks Green Silence racing flats just don't cut it on the Boulder trails.
All told, and as usual, my legs felt far better on the trails than they do on the roads, or what passes for trails, around here. This is despite the undoubtably more difficult nature of the running. I think it has more to do with the varied nature of the terrain, which involves a larger array of muscles than you use on the road (stabilizers especially). All in all, it was a great way to top out what was already an excellent week of running. My mileage is increasing steadily, but not too quickly, and I have hopes of getting some excellent runs in this summer.
What surprised me on my run today, tying in with my last post, was the number of people running on the trails with headphones. I find this unfathomable: why would you disconnect yourself from your run that way? You're running on some of the most beautiful trails around, and listening to them is at least as important as seeing and feeling them. I even saw two people obviously running together, each with their headphones in.
I cannot understand that, and it will never be me.
As for the aforementioned drama, we brought home a new cat last night. So far, the introduction to our, admittedly bad, cat has gone reasonably well. Far better than I expected, actually, as our cat has not yet physically attacked the new adoption. However, the combination of cats did not make for the best night's sleep, and had me a bit worried about how the run would go today.
And the introduction continues. It seems to have actually taken a downhill turn this morning. Last night Jacques, our aforementioned bad cat, has hissed and growled at Gabby (assuming that's the name we switch to, rather than Butters). This morning, he proceeded to hiss at me as well.
This is not ok, clearly, and we shall have to find a way to stop it.
No comments:
Post a Comment