I woke up this morning with the intention of meeting up with the Incline Club in Manitou, but several factors (tight hamstrings, slippery ice, stomach issues, etc.) conspired to make me almost an hour late getting to Memorial Park. The first few steps down the street were pretty laughable because my hamstrings were so tight from yesterday's run. My left hamstring has been chronically tight for almost two years now, and it was really noticeable this morning. My right shin (actually the posterior tibial tendon) was tight but didn't really seem to be any worse than it's been, so I mostly just ignored it.
After taking it pretty easy through Bear Creek, I hopped on Intemann and took it all the way to Manitou where some homeless-looking guy in a van honked at me and I was obliged to converse with him briefly. It was actually my good friend Carl Leivers--assistant cross country and track coach at Emory University--who was home for a couple days for the holidays. After realizing that I was going to miss the Incline Club, I decided to make use of the fact that I was in Manitou and try to get some vertical in.
Going up Barr to No Name Creek was characteristically beautiful, and I ran into Dan Vega and Matt C coming down from Longs Ranch Road. The trail is really starting to get icy--coming down I wished I had some screws in my shoes.
The run back home was actually pretty rough. I had plenty of gels, but my legs were just plain tired from yesterday. I navigated the climb up Ridge Road through the Garden just fine (never hurts to get a little pavement in the legs--good preparation if I ever want to jump in a road marathon), but the last 45 minutes or so of the run I was really bonking and just trying to keep moving. But, that's what Sundays are all about--simulating the fatigue of a second half of a 100 miler.
I got home just in enough time to grab a shower before heading to work at noon, but I was only able to put a couple energy bars in my pocket to eat, so I spent the day at work thinking a lot about what I was going to eat once I was off at 5 and also about how much it sucks to have to stand up for 5 hours after having run 30 miles.
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