Crawling Might Be Faster

Remember how I said I'm running the El Paso Half Marathon? Yeah, well, it's now six weeks away, heaven help me, and Cincinnati is a frigid place to be running in. I'd be lying if I didn't say I'm looking forward to the warmth of El Paso almost as much as I'm looking forward to seeing my friends who live there. One of those warms the cockles of my heart; the other warms my numb fingertips so I can feel them again.

Because I don't know this city well yet, my long runs have been a bit of a challenge. I'm trying to stick to straight lines as much as possible until I have a better map of the city in my head, because while getting lost is a wonderful way to fill in the gaps in that map, getting lost while in the middle of a 9-mile run in 25-degree weather is not my idea of a good time.

We happened to have a warm (55°) but rainy day last week, and that's when I decided to head out for my scheduled 8-miler. And I decided to go downtown to run near the river. Great ideas so far, right?

Well.

Try not to look too closely at my speed. This is going to be a slow race.

My neighborhood is on top of a hill. Downtown has a river running through it (hence the low & flat, once I got there). Why the hill back up looks more gradual than the hill going down I don't know, because it was the exact same hill, and I barely dragged myself up it. If a bus had been coming by while I was trying to get through that last quarter mile, I probably would have gotten aboard. And then dripped all over everything, because I was soaked through from the rain. I think I got drier when I got into the shower.

I know, some of you live in hillier places than I do and manage to go out and crush your runs. Please don't tell me about it. It's depressing enough thinking about doing this one again. But, another one finished, another day closer to my next half.

What are you one day closer to?