In spite of yesterday’s crabbiness, I did in fact make it out for a run. I phoned up my friend Liz because I figured I needed some company.
Also, I wanted to run fast, and Liz runs fast.
I have a hard time making myself run fast on my own. When I start, my body/brain says “whoa there girl, take a big ease down. we still have a few miles to go”. And I listen.
When I run with Liz though, pride takes over. And even though the body/brain is saying “aack! woah!” the pride is saying “shut it” and is forcing my legs to keep up to her legs. Her very fast legs.
So we started off at a decent clip – not sure exactly how fast we were going but it felt *brisk*. I’m not sure of the distance from our starting point to the first grid road, but I knew that every road after that was 1 mile, so I was hitting my lap button on my watch at each road. Here’s what it looked like:
Start to the first road (just over a mile?) – 9:56 This felt brisk but ok, and since I didn’t know how far exactly that stretch was, I had no idea what I was in for.
Mile 2 – 8:46 This is where I looked at my watch and thought “uh oh” and pride started forcing my legs to keep going. I told myself that I had held this pace during the 5k race on Saturday. Myself told me "sure, but that was 5k. This is 8”. Good point.
Mile 3 – 8:34 When I hit my lap button here, I almost fell over. This mile had felt quite slow, so I was surprised that it was even faster than our last one. And I don’t know if I’ve ever run a mile that fast, for sure not in the middle of a 5mile run. I may have hollered the split time at Liz and said “I don’t run this fast!!”. She thinks apparently I do.
Mile 4 – 8:46 During this mile I was wishing that I had my earphones in and my music turned up so that I couldn’t hear myself heaving breathing. Then I was wishing that Liz had her earphones in and her music turned up. Because I do believe I sounded like a dying wildebeest. Or at least a wounded wildebeest who is running 5 miles much faster than it usually does.
Final stretch – 7:25 At this point I had been willing my legs to keep up for 4 miles. The slight downhill to town was a blessing. The flat road through town felt like Everest. When we finally hit the end I stopped dead and bent over with my hands on my knees and willed myself not to pass out. Because after that heroic effort, it would be embarrassing.
When the black spots faded and my vision cleared and the nausea passed, I felt like Superwoman. I have never run 5 miles that fast. In fact, prior to that moment, my fastest “average” mile time had been a 9min mile. And I had just run one in 8:34. Stupendous. I felt strong. Invincible. Incredible. And then I started walking again. And I was glad that it was only a block and a half to my car.
