Trail Run at the Pig Trail

This is what happens when you just show up and no one else does. Of course, you have to be willing to run or walk 7.2 miles, which I was. Yes, I won again the Masters division of the Middle Georgia Endurance Trail Run Series. The second race was yesterday and I had a free entry since I won it last month. This time it wasn't quite as easy because it was longer and hillier and I really don't run much more than 2 miles most mornings, but hey, I have no shame in walking and again, I know this trail well enough that I knew I could short cut back if I had to. I did walk a few hills in the last two miles, but I didn't shortcut back. My time was one hour, twenty seven minutes and twenty six seconds. This gets me a free entry into next month's race, which will be at the Selma Irwin Mountain Bike Trail in Milledgeville. I've ridden that trail once, many years ago, and I remember it being very hilly and very rocky. It will also no doubt be a longer run, so I really should up my weekly mileage. I had every intention of running this morning, but I am too sore.

I've also ordered real trail shoes. I adore my Asics, but they're road shoes and I banged my toes a lot on roots, so badly once that I tore a toe nail. The scabs on my knees are from tripping on a root between miles one and two and falling. Ouch. I jumped right back up, but my knees hurt today. It's too hot to wear jeans, which I did last night, and they hurt my knees. Woe!

Why do I do this? Because being out in the woods and suffering is a heck of a lot more fun than sitting on the couch. I really rather enjoy pushing myself, too. I find that when my brain starts whining that it's too hard, there are too many more miles, that if I tell it that this stride, this stride right now, well, it's not so hard, and the last mile or miles wasn't bad, that I'm alive, that I can run another ten feet and it's only a series of ten feet and then ten feet more and that in the time my brain is thinking about that, look brain, you've already been further than that while we're having this conversation, so keep going! And then my brain shuts up and I start repeating some song on endless loop, just a chorus or one verse, and that keeps my simple brain entertained for another mile.

And then I finish and I'm always so glad that I did it. Because I'm crazy that way.