The blizzard winds kicked up the 3-4 feet of snow when I set out on the course that was uphill both ways. Did I mention I was barefoot?
Ok, ok. Maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration.
Regardless of the hyperbole, today was my first run outside in nearly 3 years. The last time I ran outside (Turkey Trot 2010) I don't really recall it being a particularly pleasant experience.
I got up at 5am to make sure I had plenty of time to run and make it back home in time for 1st day of school festivities. I went to try out the certified 5k course that the hospital put together for the upcoming race.
Initially when I started running, I had a bad feeling about how things were going to go. I felt all gangly and out of sync, and the ground felt really hard. I was having to keep an eagle eye on Runkeeper because I kept surging up to a pace that there's no way I was going to be able to sustain. About 5 minutes in though, I settled in--I started feeling relaxed and no longer had to constantly check my phone for pace info.
I'll admit that a 12 min pace feels a lot slower in person than it does on the treadmill. I foresee running outside seriously propelling me forward in pace and distance.
Well, somehow I managed to make a wrong turn on a closed loop course and only ended up running 2.77 miles(??) at an 11:38 pace (with each mile split getting faster), but no matter. I felt really good. And next week, or maybe even later this week I'll head back out there and run the full course.
I was surprised how quickly my run went. Compared to the treadmill this run seemed to fly by. And it was nice being able to see landmarks, and my progress towards them.
I'm going to refrain from running outside for the next couple of days to make sure that my feet and legs are going to transition without pain. And I may hit the treadmill this afternoon to finish off a few treadmill miles.
Overall it was very nice experience.
Even if the blowing snow made it hard to see my bare feet as I ran uphill both ways...
