From the Road to the Trails

Yesterday I ran a 2-person relay with my friend Michelle at the Vermont City Marathon.  It was totally fun and I broke 2 hours for my half marathon time; a personal record.  This was my 4th year as a participant in VCM.  The first year I was part of a 5-person relay and the last two years I ran the full marathon.  It was pretty sweet yesterday to hit mile 8 and contemplate another 5 miles rather than another 18.  And the Vermont City Marathon is really the greatest race in terms of organization, crowd support, course, etc.  Because I ran the first leg, I was able to spend over an hour as a spectator at the finish line.  I saw one woman puke while running, a man basically get carried across the finish line by 3 or 4 other people, our local Judge finish the full marathon, lots of bloody nipples and my team mate's glorious finish. We also had a great long weekend with the Fays at the our favorite house in Burlington, which we have enjoyed as an exchange 5 times.  Wow!

Now that the Half is over, I'm going to hit the trails hard in preparation for the Black Fly in My Eye 10 mile trail race over near Mt. Washington at the end of June.  I did this race the first year they held it, 4  years ago, and it was incredibly challenging.  I swore I'd never do it again.  It was brutal. One leg of it is pretty much a mountain climb, at which point I saw no other runners and thought I might be lost (I wasn't) and the end is really intense because you go down a steep hill, across a shallow but wide river and then up the embankment to cross the finish line, with everyone watching you so you feel really self-conscious and worried you're going to slip and make a fool of yourself.  But I convinced some friends to do it with me this year and I'm really psyched about it; a serious challenge, but not too much pavement pounding.  It's going to be awesome.