16 miles– woot woot!

I RAN 16 MILES!

16 whole miles. Not half miles, not fake miles, but 16 real, whole miles. And even better? I didn’t walk for a single bit of them! Annnd I get to count 3.1 of them towards The Boring Runner’s annual Sweat Your Thorns  Off 5k!

So, here’s the story: I got up around 6am on Saturday and was psyched with the weather forecast. A cold front had rolled into Denver overnight and the high for the day was 80 degrees. Seriously! Basically, that meant the temps were not going above 70-72 degrees until after noon. How lucky was I?

I ate my breakfast staple foods and downed a glass of disgusting looking water-Nuun-chia seeds. As I mentioned, I still have a few tubes of Nuun left, so I thought I would just throw those in some water with the chia seeds and get a hydration burst before running. But….it looked like a lab experiment.

The Nuun made the water fizzy and sent all the chia straight to the top of the glass. Of course, this wonderfulness was completed with little bubbles of Nuun-carbonation. Yes, it looks disgusting. And yes, I drank it anyway!

I was also super excited to start running because I bought a new Camelbak! My other one was a bit too large and was kinda driving me nuts. When I saw this one at REI, I absolutely could not pass it up!

I mean, it’s pink! It holds 50oz which is about my max for a pack that doesn’t jostle and annoy me when I’m running.

Anyway, I set out around 7am and ran 5 miles with Tally before returning her home. Then, I headed east towards my parents house. I knew my mom was planning on running a few miles, so I decided to stop in to see if she had left yet. Luckily, she was getting ready to head out, so she and I ran together for the next 6.5 miles. She runs significantly slower than me (like 13-14 min miles), but that didn’t bother me in the least. It was SO NICE to have company and made the miles fly!

After I dropped mom back off at her house, I essentially ran back to my house and ran in circles until I had my last couple of miles knocked out. I did notice that running so slow for the middle half made it much easier for me to cover all of the miles– it was far less difficult than it has been in the past. However, my IT bands were absolutely screaming at me over the last two miles! It’s been a long time since my legs have hurt that bad, but I largely blame it on my shoes. I’ve noticed that my Pure Cadences are about ready for a replacement, and I was pushing the mileage on them as it was. I have never, ever had my legs hurt like this before, so I think it’s just a sign that I buy a new pair!

Disgusting, sweat-covered mess… but I did it!

Even better? They have a new hot pink color that I NEED to purchase!

Total stats: 16 miles
Time: 3hr 7 min
Pace: 11:40

Nice and slow…but it’s done!