I last ran on Tuesday morning, then it rained all day. I got caught in the rain a couple of times, so Wednesday I woke up with a stuffy nose and a tight chest. Great. Wednesday rained a lot too and all I could think about was of a short run in the muddy and slippery trails… And even though I felt a bit sick (the sniffles, the sleepiness, yuk…), you know nothing is stopping the run from happening… I figured it’d be a tiny 4 miler, off to bed early, and we’d call it a day. HA! I was in for a treat.
I headed out in the craziest outfit I could think of. I swear it was all running clothes but it was (basically….) a pink bra and white shorts, craziness, almost lingerie. I need to wear it again and get a picture. Of course, I didn’t plan on slipping and falling right in my white shorts. Fabulous look. I stepped in a few puddles too, I was a mess, groggy and all… But OMG was I so happy to be running. It was so humid though, it felt more like swimming. My last two runs were in the VFFs and oh I could tell how my form had changed from doing to runs in them in a row. I was all tall and straight, like a robot runner, or like Ryan Hall. I tend to bend forward when I get tired, but not in the VFFs. Those things are REALLY correcting my form flaws! And I felt super fast. Better posture = faster runner. OSOM.
Some stuff must have gotten into my shoes, something was rubbing the back of my feet (does that have a name?), yeah, both feet. I stopped, took them off, shook them, kept going. By then I had done 3 miles, way faster than “easy”, more like pikermi pace but I felt good. Then tackled my hill. “My hill” is a third of a mile incline (elevation: 22) that I use for my hill sprints. I just felt like sprinting it. And there we go. I looked in my brain for the fastest time up there…mmm…. 1:34! I am ok, 1:40 would be fine. Lots of ahs, uhs, and pufffs later, I hit lap and I see 1:27. WHAT? There must be a mistake. Let’s try again: 1:29. Nice!!!! I am on a horse! I stopped at 2 repeats because there’s a race I want to do Saturday morning and I won’t recover in time if I did more than that…
Then I see a LOT of people headed to the Great Lawn…. I think, I think, oh!!! the New York Philharmonic! Crap, I forgot it was Wednesday too!! And they do fireworks after the concert…. There is nothing, nothing, I repeat NOTHING, like fireworks in Central Park. You’ll pee yourself it is so OSOM. (They have fireworks in the Park thenightbeforethemarathonohmygod!). It’s 7:45. They start at 8, I want to see some of it.
My foot is hurting. I sit down to look and I see insane blisters, the size of my thumb, on each foot. WTH??? There’s no rocks, but the asics feel really hard back there, maybe because they got wet? These shoes have like 150 miles on them and this never happened. GGRRR. I keep going, by 8:20 I swing by the Great Lawn and the Orchestra is on, I just felt like this park was a magical place. There I was, dripping sweat, in my crazy and dirty outfit, listening to this amazing music, under the stars, shoes off. I felt amazing. I looked totally insane.
This is what the NY Philharmonic Concert in the Park looks like… Gorgeous, right?
But I was starting to hurt; walking was impossible with the shoes on. By the time I got home, I had done 8 miles (double the plan) and my socks were red. Yes, blood. I thought of Brian Sell in Beijing with his bloody shoes and I laughed. I was SO happy, I didn’t care. As if I hadn’t run in months… I really need to move INTO the park.
ON A HORSE! (cough, cough)
runningandthecity 