10 Miles!!! What goes up, must come down. (And vice versa?)

My legs are like proverbial jello.

In anticipation of the hills in San Francisco, I've been selecting a variety of long runs that contain mountains. Yesterday, I chose to break my double digit barrier with an uphill climb over and around Mt. Falcon. For the first 4.4 mi it was all uphill. All of it. I passed plenty of moms celebrating Mother's day with their families, several couples trudging up the mountain with the help of walking sticks, some unruly dogs, and I was passed by what I can only imagine was an elite runner (probably training for the Olympics...)  I didn't run up that mountain with any kind of speed, mind you. But that's not the point. Right?


For anyone wishing to torture themselves by running up a mountain, I would highly recommend this one. It started with a gorgeous view of Red Rocks amphitheater, then toured the ruins of some man's dream house, flattened up a bit at the top and plummeted down into some wooded paths before climbing (again!), and then passing through a mountain top meadow. Beautiful scenery! If only I could have paid more attention to my surroundings rather than looking down to make sure I didn't trip over a rock! Fortunately, I was moving slowly enough to spy many a deer grazing. I even had to holler at one to get out of my path. It moved, reluctantly, and only a few feet out of my path. What goes uphill, though, must go 4.4 miles down hill. Turns out downhill isn't so nice on your knees-- but much faster.

To date, I have run a cumulative 89 miles since my 'official' training started. (I use quotations because I was running 4 x a week for a full two months before my official training started.  I wasn't counting miles, though, but rather minutes). Last week I did my long run (8 mi) around City Park--a nice, flat, urban street run in good time (10 min/mi). So, I'm not too concerned that I was essentially running a 13:30 min/mi uphill and at 5800' elevation yesterday. I'm hoping that my street running will harmoniously mesh with my trail running to produce the perfect San Fransisco marathon training program. Hills meet asphalt in my leg muscles--which, coincidentally, really hurt today. 

After getting lost on the way to and from my run in Morrison (darn Google maps, always trying to put me on the interstate!), I realized that I was pretty lucky living so close to the trails in Boulder. My long runs are going to take up an increasing part of my Sundays from here on out since it takes 30-40 minutes to get to the trails from my house in Denver.

I also want to take a moment to THANK everyone who has donated to my fund-raising cause!!!! I have already raised 36%, not including a substantial off-line donation. Look out for invites to my fund-raising events!