Schedule, shmedule!

Middle schoolers with their tissue paper hot air balloon; look close to see another up in the air

This week's long run was scheduled to be 22 miles on Saturday. Well, I miss meeting up with my Saturday gang and they're only running an hour on Saturdays, and they start around 7:30, and I don't much like the idea of leaving the house at 4 a.m. Saturday so I can get 3.5 hours of running in before joining in the group run.

So! I thought I'd move my long run to Friday and do my 10 mile run Saturday, which would mean only needing to run about an hour before meeting the gang.

Then last night I started hearing dire warnings of a snow storm moving in tomorrow (Thursday) night with 7 inches of snow fall expected overnight accompanied by gusty winds, all continuing into the day Friday. Huh. By this morning I thought ya' know, I really don't relish running for 4+ hours in a whole lotta snow and wind.

So! As I got dressed this morning, I made the decision to switch my long run to today. Yes I had done hill repeats yesterday. No I had not done any pampering or extra carbo consumption yesterday. But, what the heck, the whole point is to toughen up, right?

The run broke out roughly into thirds: The first third was warming up into the whole affair by heading east and getting on a north/south trail (Bobolink and South Boulder Creek). Much to my delight, I ran into two friends also running South Boulder Creek which livened up the introductory portion of the run considerably. The second third started with a planned rendezvous with running buddy Amie and accompanying her on her 90 minute run. Many highlights of that portion of the run including spotting a mysterious flying object which turned out to be a sort of hot-air balloon contraption built out of glued-together tissue paper by a middle school science class. Twas great fun tracking down the flying object then talking to the students about it. The final third was an exercise of mind over matter. I was definitely feeling fatigued and just had to keep myself zigging and zagging so I'd run the scheduled distance. But I hadn't mapped this out in advance; how to figure the distance? Huh.

So! Assuming I was running pretty slow, I estimated 12 minute miles thus 12 x 22 = 264 = 4 hours 24 minutes. Too hard to remember so figure 4.5 hours. Got to one zig place about 30 minutes from home but it wasn't quite 4 hours yet. Zag. Got to another zig place only 20 minutes from home but it wasn't quite 4:10 yet. Zag. And zig and zag and keep on keeping on, do the hokey pokey, that's what it's all about.

Final result: 4 hours 36 minutes and 23 miles. Schedule, shmedule.

One of today's lessons: when tired, look about you. Inspiration abounds.