The Relay

I apologize for the extra time it is taking me to get this post up. I have been fighting a cold for a handful of days (a couple handfuls now). Since the run I have been resting as much as I can, but that doesn't seem to be curing me.

The day of the race, I woke up feeling absolutely drained, it already felt like a long day. I stared at the coffee maker fully aware that I didn't want to drink coffee and I didn't want to eat breakfast, I did the best I could. The morning found me at work, convinced that I would fall asleep or burst into tears at any moment. I survived with neither of the expected scenarios taking place, bought a triple grande latte (soy) on the way to the race and was out of my skin hyper while stuck in traffic (where did all this traffic come from?). I was thrilled when it was finally time to start running. I started the run with friend from another team (the IT Hotties...My team went with the very descriptive "potential run and the aluminum day," it came from a band name generator one of my mates found online). Right, so we are running, the mud is still somewhat avoidable at this point in the run, but the rain shows no sign of slowing. About a mile into the run (it could be more, all the brain power I had was focused on maintaining my speed) people had spread out enough that you could comfortably run your own pace. This was a major concern of mine going into this run, the trail is so narrow, how would we pass people (or, heaven forbid, get passed by people)? The answer, jump off the trail and let them go...I am proud to say that I passed more people than I was passed by. The last I saw of my IT Hottie friend was at the top of a muddy hill, he yelled "ouch" and that was the end of his run. It was really difficult to stay upright with all the mud, a few miles into it there was no choice but to run through it (I was thrilled, my painfully green trail shoes were brown in no time).
I nearly ate mud out there, I rolled my ankle in 6 inches of mud and spent the next few steps staring stright into the mud. I just kept throwing my feet as far forward as I could and managed to recover myself without tasting the mud. This was an amazing moment for me. I have yet to fall on a run and I thought this might be the moment. My ankle hurt more than I cared to acknowledge but the only way to figure out if it is really hurt is to just keep running, and so I did. The whole course was a great ankle workout, in the days following the race I noticed my only sore muscles were the ones used to keep my feet stabalized.

To an extent I wish i had taken a spill on the course, this would have been a good time to get my "first fall" out of the way. The thick mud seemed like a good cushion for preventing injury on the way down. Then again, one of my friends was limping after the race due to a fall ( he also had mud all over his face and I must admit, he wore it well). Maybe the mud can hurt you...

I'm sorry, again, for the delay in posting this. It is now Friday and I still feel sick, I have only worked out once this week and it was not fun. Tomorrow I am running the Nookachamps half marathon in Mt Vernon, WA.