The journey from fat to fit. Road trip, woo hoo!

I ran my Virtual 5k this morning, a little late but I think (hope) that’s okay.  I set out at 7:30 a.m., which is an early run for me, and it was nice to be on the path with a lot less foot traffic.  Unfortunately, the path runs along the river and one side and a road on the other.  When I usually run, the road is virtually traffic free.  But at 7:30 a.m., it’s really busy, a lot of truck traffic and, yuck, exhaust.

 As a result, I deviated off of my pre-mapped out exactly 3.1 mile route and ended up running 3.5 miles.  My total time was 44 minutes 57 seconds.  Using my fourth-grade math skills, I figure I hit the 3.1 mile mark in about 39 minutes, so I am declaring my 5k time to be 39 minutes.

It was a nice morning, the heat hasn’t set in yet, and the river is serene.  I forgot to bring my iPod, so I jogged alone with my thoughts, which can be dangerous and somewhat scary, but was actually pretty calming this morning.  I started out with a comfortable jog, which based on my treadmill experience I would estimate is between 4.5-4.8 miles per hour.  I stayed there for the entire run, no speed bursts, no recovery walks.  Nice and steady. 

The morning trail people are much more friendly than the afternoon trail folk.  Or that could just be my perception since I forgot to bring a hat or visor and I was actually making eye contact with people.  When I was about 1/2 mile from my finish line I said good morning to someone, and realized I wasn’t having any heavy breathing… not even my usual lamaze-esque jogging breathing.  So I probably should have pushed it a little more.

But it felt good to be out, it felt good to be running.  My shadow looked very svelte in the morning sun as opposed to short and squat in the evening sun.  All in all, a success.

Thanks, Wee, for organizing this virtual 5k!