"Was it Super Fun?" Yes, it was!

This morning Karma and I joined Bruce and Dan for a 10 mile recovery run (2m for Karma). Legs felt just fine, but towards the end I could definitely feel them a little fatigued. I really hoped we'd get at least some drizzle, if not some steady rain but unlike Saturday's run, it was not meant to be.

Yesterday I read Kristin Armstrong's column on Runner's World about running in the rain, and the very first comment caught my eye.

After I returned from a rainy run this spring, I told my 5 year old daughter that it rained during my whole run. In reply she asked, "Was it Super Fun?" Yes, it was!

That was the perfect description to my 30mile run on Saturday!
The night. The trails. The rain. The company. The laughs. The "hurt so good"!
Yes, it was super fun! I absolutely LOVED it!

Ken, Jason, Dan, newcomer David S, and I, met at 3am in the rain and took off for a 3 hour run. The rain was steady until about 15 mins into our run, when it started pouring! A little challenging to run in the rain at night (on a rocky trail) as you can't really wear a cap AND a headlamp, but it was a blast. The rain and the 72 degree weather kept us nice and cool, and I felt like a kid in a candy store. Refilled our water bottles a couple of times at the top of the Hill of Life from out water drop, and then by 6am, we returned to the cars and replaced Jason and David who were done, with Bruce and Muz who were up for 3 hours too.

I stuck to my now proven nutrition strategy, and kept up with electrolytes, helping me stay strong throughout. We definitely picked up the pace considerably for the second 3-hour set, partly because we didn't have a rookie runner with us, partly because eventually we got some daylight, but mostly because I led that way and purposely pushed the pace. I ran up the hill of life all 4 times, including 2 hard hard runs at hour 4 and 5, and attacked every hill I could for the last hour and a half. We stayed off the flat parts of the greenbelt, somewhat due to the heavy rains had it all looking like a lake, but also because I wanted to run hilly trails for 6 hours. Running flatlands has it's benefits, but not on my "workout" days.

Overall, my legs were strong and very responsive throughout; and even though I felt a bit of fatigue the last 30minutes, I think it was more mental as I knew we were headed back to the cars. Pretty sure I could have gone another hour to 90 minutes at those paces if that was the original plan.

Really happy with my progress so far, as I really wan't expecting to be running that well and that hard in the latter stages of a 6 hour (30mile) trail run. Bring on Cactus Rose!