The Trail to the End of the Week

It feels like someone took a baseball bat to my legs.  Only below the knees, but they were thorough.  Calves, shins, ankles.

The long run for this week was 13 miles at PMP (planned marathon pace) + 30 seconds.  This is about 25 to 30 seconds faster than I had been doing my long runs, but really, I had been having to slow myself down to hit the pace I was after.  So, I really wasn't concerned going in to the run.  And after all, the target pace for today's workout was a good 55 seconds slower than I had just run the half marathon.  How hard could that be?  I seem to find myself asking that question a lot this week.

When at home, I generally do my long runs on the Santa Fe trail.  It runs for a 15 mile stretch starting a Palmer Lake and ending in Colorado Springs and is a great biking and running trail.  It is also part of a larger trail system that runs north / south along the front range of Colorado.  I typically go early(ish) on Saturday mornings, with my goal to be running by 7:00 am in the fall / winter (generally 6:30 am in the summer).  There are many reasons to run on trails, and I am blessed to have a nice trail within 10 minutes of my house.

Why trail run?  Here's my list:

• the scenery is much more tranquil than running on the roads;
• there are no traffic lights at which you have to stop;
• in fact, there is no traffic nor the accompanying exhaust;
• there are often people of like mind out and about on the trail;
• and for those of us getting up there in age, a great benefit of trail running is the softer surface.

I must confess I have not done much trail running past early fall.  Actually, I don't think I have done any trail running after October.  Today I learned what many more experienced trail runners already know.  The condition of the trail can be greatly affected by the weather.  Earlier in the week we had a few inches of snow in Colorado Springs.  Anywhere from an inch up to maybe 6 inches, depending on where you live.  The Santa Fe trail was on the higher end of the snowfall scale this time.  Snow in Colorado Springs is generally gone with in a couple of days of hitting the ground.  We just don't get that cold.  And when we do, it doesn't last for long.

Most of the snow fell on Sunday and Monday of this week and as I look out my office window this morning, I see snow on roof tops and in yards.  Nothing left on the roads, but the amount of snow left is very unusual.  I can imagine what happened out on the Santa Fe trail this week.  As the days warmed up, people went out to run and bike on the trail.  During the heat of the day, the trail must have been quite muddy.  Riding and running on a muddy trail leaves definite ruts and foot prints.

Mud was, in fact, my only real concern about the condition of the trail last night; that it might be too muddy to run on this morning.  Turns out there was no need to worry - the trail wasn't muddy this morning, as the temperatures last night were in the 20's.  The trail was nice and solid.  Nice and solid and a battlefield of ruts and footprints from the week.  It's not an exaggeration to say that for most of my run, I could not find a level spot of ground to put my foot on.  This is of course, why it feels like someone took a baseball bat to my legs.  And then there were the hills that faced north so that they don't get any sun.  They were covered with hard packed snow - uneven and slippery.

Don't get me wrong, the scenery, the other runners, and the lack of traffic, still made it an amazing morning to be out running.  But I'm seriously considering doing future long runs on the roads when the trail condition is a little rough.  I'm just not sure my legs can take the beating.  As far as today's workout goes, I hit my pace.  Exactly.  It was harder than it needed to be due to the condition of the trail, but I feel good I finished the week on track.  One down, 15 to go.  Tomorrow, a day of rest.