After my run on Saturday, the little piggy that stayed home was really squealing about the fact that I hadn't let him stay home. My foot just wasn't happy in the slightest. I came iced it, put on my compression socks, and elevated it. in hopes of getting the pain to subside. However, unless my foot was in my shoe, it just hurt every time I stood on it. As the day progressed, I began to have some doubts about running on Sunday. But when I woke up my foot felt better and I decided to tape it up, go on with my run, and just see how things went.
It rained again on Saturday night and part of Sunday morning, which I knew would mean that the ground would still be soft and slick. I decided to just stick with the same course that I ran the day before as to not complicate matters. When I got to Umstead, I noticed a lot more cars in the parking lot that I normally see on Sunday. It seemed that a local Church was having their service out doors under on of the picnic shelters just of to the side of the trail I run along. They began to sing just as I was preparing to start my run, which seemed to punctuate the peacefulness of the moment in a way that is really difficult to describe. I am in no way a religious person, and I am not about to tell you about any sort of awakening or anything, but I will say that listening to the sound of singing as I made my way down the trail and into the woods helped me get my mind into a very peaceful place and reminded me a great deal of this scene from O'Brother Where Art Thou:
The rest of the run went really well. My foot held up well and my legs felt better than they have since my trip to WV. I felt like I was running stronger than I had the day before, but there wasn't any big difference in overall times. I was hoping that the congregation would still bee singing as I went back up the trail, but they were in praying when I returned. But, hey -- I am not going to complain. They were their to do their thing I was their to do mine, and for a few moments those two things just happened to overlap nicely for me.
After the run my toe was even more pissed at me than it had been the day before, which would cause me to finally give in, take some anti-inflammatory medication, take Monday off, and schedule lifting days for Tuesday and Wednesday in order to let my foot heal. Still, I don't regret my Sunday run because the experience itself was so unique that the memory of it is well worth any pain that I felt after words.
3.76 miles in 41:28.95 at an 11:02 pace
Mile 1 9:54.85
Mile 2 12:27.63
Mile 3 10:23.27
.76 8:43.20 11:28
What a beautiful experience!
ReplyDeleteSorry that the toe is t'oed now though : (