Third Time's a Charm - not 11, but 12 miles!!

Last Saturday I had planned to run my 11 miler, my longest run to date. I mapped it out the night before, laid out my clothes and then got up before 7am to find rain, so I went back to bed. All of Saturday was horrible weather-wise, so no run at all.

Sunday I got up before 7am and found kinda yucky weather, not the worst, but enough for me to talk myself out of it. Some snow had accumulated and the roads weren't cleared and I just wasn't feeling it.

Plus, my husband wasn't home yet. He works nights and then after work on Saturday (~3am) he and his buddies hold a poker tournament. The big winner will go play in some huge tournament in Vegas in May, so it's kind of a bid deal (so he says). Anyway, he doesn't get home until 8ish on Sunday morning and then usually sleeps the day away before going back to work that night. I called him and he was close to home, so we decided to go out to breakfast instead of me going for a run, that was an easy decision.

After a nice big Sunday breakfast and a nice long nap, I was up and ready for my third try at my 11 miler for the weekend. The sun was out and so was the traffic, so instead of the city route I had mapped out which is all on dirt roads with no sidewalks, I headed to the Metropark.

It was really sunny and nice when I arrived and parked further down the path than I usually do. After the first 4 miles to the end of the park and back I passed my car and dropped my running jacket and picked up my water bottle. I don't have a real hand-held running water bottle yet - I really need to look into one of those. The next three miles took me to the front of the park where I turned back around.

Passing my car again put me at 10.5 miles and I knew I only had a half mile left - broken down into a quarter mile past the car, turn around and run back to be done - but I felt the need to push it a little more. I run a consistent (slow to most people) speed and felt pretty good. I ran out a little bit further and when I turned back and ended at my car I had hit just over 12 miles!

I had it in the back of my head to push to 12 once I hit 11 miles, thinking what's one more mile at that point and it felt pretty good. I wasn't loving every second of it and my legs were certainly tired, but I was still running in good form. This run really made me feel much better about my upcoming Half in Grosse Ile in a couple weeks.

This 12 miler is the longest long run I'm going to run before the race on the 20th. I'll do around 8 miles this weekend and have fresh legs the the following weekend. I'm continually amazed at what my body can do and what my brain is capable of, even though I'm doing it totally on my own.

I got home and felt great!! It's been a very busy week at work for me - in early and still staying late, so I've been much more tired. Today is the first run I've had since Sunday which bums me out, but it's better than nothing. I find myself getting crabby and itching to run after missing this many days. I guess that's a good thing :)