It was a brisk morning, but honestly once we started running it wasn't bad at all. It was the Twin Cities' Marathon Weekend and it's billed as "the prettiest run in the United States". This may be true - the fall colors were gorgeous, and we got to run down a very historic area of St. Paul lined with old Victorian mansions. Tracy was way (way...way!) ahead of us, but afterward in comparing notes she and I said we weren't really able to enjoy the sights because we noticed we slowed way down when we did.
In our training (which I kind of dragged Mike into...but I think he was glad he did it) Mike and I had had a plan to switch "leading" in the run with every mile. I told him I was going to lead the first mile because in practice he always took off the first mile and I thought I was going to die. I like to warm up a bit. Well, the first thing you encountered on this run was this big hill. I should also mention that Mike doesn't slow down on hills - in fact, he runs faster. Immediately our training plans were out the window. He was ready to get to the top, and I was ready to take it nice and easy to ensure I made it to the top. After awhile I told him he could totally run ahead of me and I wouldn't feel bad in the least.
He did run ahead a little bit, but to his credit I saw him looking back to check on me often. I was totally fine with it. I know I'm not a fast runner, but I also know I get faster as I go so I figured by the end I'd be much closer to him (but not to Tracy...that girl is like the Road Runner compared to me). What brought us together in the end was Mike's shoelace came untied. He stopped to tie it, I ran past him and he caught up with me and we ran the last couple miles together.
We ended in 1 hour, 16 seconds. That put us at a 9 minute 45 second pace. Like I said, we aren't fast, but this was the fastest we had run in all our training and it was the furthest I had ever run in my life! I am pretty happy with the results. Mike was happy with our run too...except he really hated that we were 16 seconds short of doing the whole thing in under an hour. I guess we have a new goal for next time.
Tracy did awesome - I think she was around an 8 minutes 30 second pace; I think she beat her goal too!
I don't know if I'd do this race again right away. There was an awful lot of hills. Mostly I don't remember running down any - just up. The last big hill a guy was cheering on the sidelines and said, "This is the last hill! You can do it!" Mike ran by him and said, "Promise?" Then we came to a little incline right before the finish line and Mike said, "I think this qualifies as a hill too." By then, I think a stair tread would have qualified as a hill to us.
Tracy has her sights set on a 10 miler in the spring. I think I'm good sticking with the 10K (6.2 miles) for now. But for the immediate future we'll be riding out the little high from this and take a break on "serious" training and concentrate on just getting out there and moving.
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