Heading home to run 26.2 by MikeFromNC

It was 12 degrees when I woke last Saturday.  This week, I woke to a temperature of nearly 50 degrees.  Without checking the forecast the night before, I had laid out tights, long sleeve shirt, gloves, etc. for a cold morning run.  With a smile on my face, I threw all that stuff back in the drawer and pulled out shorts and a short-sleeve shirt.

This has been a relatively easy "recovery" week with a total of about 26 miles.  Tuesday was speed intervals of a half mile each.  (I'm using the word "speed" pretty loosely here, by the way.)  Thursday was an 8-mile run with 6 miles at a long tempo pace.  Monday and Wednesday are my cross-training days.

It had been a pretty stressful week, so I was really looking forward to the 13 miles on Saturday.  The pace was a bit faster than any of the other long runs so far - marathon pace + 15 seconds/mile.  When it comes to the location of my Saturday runs, I'm a creature of habit and I go back to the same place each week.  This typically means a short out-and-back on a trail before getting on a greenway that connects to a couple of parks.  For some reason, I built up the significance of the trail run in my mind and I decided to run the course in the reverse order this week, placing the out-and-back section in the middle of the run.

This plan seemed blessed from the moment my feet hit the mulch and pine needles that carpeted the forest floor.  Two miles later, the worries of the week were just a memory.

Favorite moment of the run:  A section of the trail runs by the side of a stream and an open field.  At this moment, I suddenly found myself surrounded by the brilliant indigo of a flock of bluebirds.  I've never seen so many in one place at the same time before and it was literally stunning.

Song-of-the-run:  "Where the Streets Have No Name" by U2.  This is one of my favorite running songs and the opening crescendo kicked in right as I entered the woods.  I kept hitting 'repeat' until the trees were behind me.