Running is Indeed a Mind Game

As is typical lately, I am behind on my posts. I ran on Friday half of the half marathon along with Hans, Chris, John, Lavonne, and Andrew. Lavonne had to quit partway through because of her hamstring. I maintained my caboose spot for most of the run, but I kept a consistent speed, tackling the hills and walking as little as possible.

Adrienne cheered us on as we ran down Montgomery. I yelled back to her to join us, but she figured she was not exactly dressed for it, lol. Another friend of mine, Lauren Friede, also cheered me on at one point. Besides these two I had several guys in vehicles yell at me (what, I don't exactly know- hard to hear and didn't really care). Apparently little short blondes running through Huntsville are entertaining. *shrug*

From the four way intersection to the old HKC entrance (adding in the block that takes you to the hill) took me 1 hour and 28 minutes. I guess that's not too terrible for 6.1 miles on that course.

This morning Hans, Phillip, Chris, John, Ron, Aaron, Andrew, and I ran at the park. I'm not sure what route Ron ended up taking, but Aaron ran from the nature center to Amy's Crossing and then back to the little dirt patch at the entrance to the park where his car was waiting. The rest of us ran the outer outer loop (8.5 miles). I completed it in 1 hour and 48 minutes.

Just like on Thursday and Friday I kept a steady pace, walked as little as possible, and tackled the hills. One part of the trail was new to me, and wow was that a hard stretch. It involved hill after hill after hill...I bet it would make an awesome descent from the other direction.

Overall I can tell I must be getting better at this, and the more I run, the more I like Adrienne's quote on her blog about running being a mind game. When I was running today, I kept telling myself, if I can convince my body to go up this next hill, just think how easy it will be to convince myself to sit down and work on my thesis later when my brain has to do the work and my body gets to sit in a nice comfy computer chair. :-P