Start time: 01/29/05, 8:00am

Location: W&OD Trail

Distance: 8 miles

Run:Walk ratio: 3:1

Average pace: 12:45min/mile

It didn’t hit me until we were on the trail this morning that it’d been two weeks since I’d gone running, y’know, outside. Yeesh. It was a nice group, especially since right as we were about to begin our friend Mark showed up. He’d already run 10 miles and was going to hit 8 more; he’s training for the Fredericksburg Marathon this spring. We offered to run with him, and hey, the fact that he was running a slower pace was ok with us. (Some of my fellow runners hadn’t been running at all in, um, a while.)

Lots of ice on sections of the W&OD Trail, still, but thankfully no one wiped out on it. And despite the arctic temperatures it went pretty well. We’d started earlier so I could then take my parents to the airport when we were done, but I’d misjudged at what time we should start (and didn’t factor in the whole “people showing up late” aspect) so I ended up only getting in 8 miles instead of 10 like I’d mentally planned, but still a very good run. Now I’m just feeling sleepy and wondering if it had anything to do with getting up a little earlier this morning, or if it’s just time to start catching back up on some ZZZs this weekend…

On the bright side, I think I’m finally thawed back out. Brrrrrrrrrrrrr. Did I mention it’s cold out?