I did it! Twenty miles in the bank! Woot!

Now, I definitely didn’t do it alone and it certainly wasn’t painless but I completed all 20 and am feeling pretty damn good.

Friday night the Redhead got in to town and we caught up over noodles with a little butter and Parmesan cheese while Project Runway occasionally distracted us in the background (“What is that, a cape?”). It was so good to see my friend and actually have a face-to-face talk instead of the text/email binge that we are normally on.

Four AM came really quickly as my alarm blared and Lloyd rolled over with his back to me. Redhead and I got up and got dressed and were out the door at about 5:00 AM. We met up with the BRA and started off with some pretty nice temperatures. It was 60 degrees out and very windy.

Redhead and Hollster quickly moved ahead of me and P-Funk and I kept reminding myself to slow down, I had 20 miles to run and couldn’t be all hare-like. Slow and steady was gonna win this race. We made it to the end at 4.5 miles and I decided to try some Gu Chomps. This was not a good idea as on the turn around I had the PC’s like no other.

I pretty much ran Redhead over as I got back near the restrooms where she was already waiting.

After that bout I was fine but I’ll be sticking to just regular Gu from here on out. As our route is a 4.5 out and back we had to add in the extra 2 miles. We decided to add it in by running into a neighborhood and stopping at a water fountain. This put us about 12 miles. Redhead and I had partnered up at this point due to logistical reasons and we were ready for a drink. I was soooooo thirsty all I could think about was the water fountain. It’s along the route at a perfect spot. As we get up to it, I press the button and nothing comes out. Oh. My. God. The water fountain is broken. Kill me now.

Redhead and I decided to continue running and I am so freaking thirsty (yes, I hydrated well the day/night before but it was really humid) that I tell her I need to run into a nearby coffee shop to drink out of the faucet. Yep. Totally drank out of a faucet. (Oh but we did try to use a hose at the broken water fountain park to no avail either.)

This part of the run is known as The Mirage. Heh.
We finally get some water and get down to mile 15.5 and I am struggling. I had since gone all quiet on Redhead who kept up my spirits and chatted along the way. God bless her. At 15.5 I picked up P-Funk who was doing 18 and Redhead reunited with Hollster. Off we went back down the 4.5 mile home stretch.

For whatever reason I felt much better on this last pass. I guess I was just so preoccupied by the water situation before that I had let the tired voices take over in my head. I was getting sore in my legs but again, a running friend, chatted and it really helped. Seriously, running with Red and P-Funk really made the difference for this 20 miler.

As for my pacing, I think I did pretty well. I felt strong enough for the last 4.5 miles to push and wound up with an average pace of 10:10. Overall, I am very happy with this run. I am surprisingly not that sore today and am going to get in a recovery run at the trails this evening.

Things are looking up on this training plan. The 20 miler may have just been the confidence booster that I needed.

I hope you all had great weekends and great runs!