The Road To Recovery

Met up with Derek and Don T. this morning. Derek, my TNT mentor, was flying out to Vancouver late this morning to visit family and go skiiing (I'm jealous), but wanted to squeeze in a "quick" run before going to the airport. Don T. is training for the full Marathon at Cowtown and joined us.

So we met at 7:00 AM at Oak Grove Park (map link) and did the Lake Grapevine Runners and Walkers Club's "west route", which is 8.3 miles for the out-and-back. We finished it in about an hour and 20 minutes (about a 9:38/mi pace). Don's marathon training schedule had him doing a 16 mile taper run today so we did the same route again after a 10 minute break at our cars (to refill water belts, grab gels, and hit the restroom). The second time was at about the same overall speed - a little more walking during the middle but we picked up the pace for the last mile - for about another 1:20 of running. So in the end, Don and I ended up doing 16.43 miles in 2:49:24 (inclusive of the "car stop"). That works out to a 10:18/mi pace, which is not too bad considering the 10 minute break and that the course was quite hilly.

After the run, I did a little cycling. Originally, the plan was to ride about 30 miles, but because we had run for so long, it was getting late (and I had lunch plans) so I only did about 14 miles. I started my bike ride by again following the west route but this time stayed on the run/bike trail (earlier we had run on the sidewalks of the busier streets) for all 8 miles. Then, contined on with the first 2.25 miles of the east route and also toured some of the parks south of Lake Grapevine. The final tally was 13.72 miles in 57:10. That's an average speed of only 14.4 MPH but some parts of the bike trail were winding and I had to slow for narrow bridges - and hey, I did just run more than 16 miles. :-)

Hmmm, it feels odd to have run 16.43 miles but biked only 13.72 miles. Never thought something like that would happen!