Oh goodness! What a run! I am very proud that I was able to run that far in Flagstaff. We ran really slowly and felt great for the first 8 miles, despite a brutal headwind. We stopped to refill our water at 8 miles and then continued. I started feeling tired around 10 miles, and it went downhill quickly from there. By 11 miles, I was hurting. It was all I could do to turn around and start back. The goal was 14 miles. I really wanted to stop at 12 miles, but I decided I would run a half marathon and walk the last .8 miles. So, I made it to 13.2 and walked. Average pace was 11:15. It was obviously much slower than normal, but I'm glad we made ourselves go slowly, because I don't think we would have made it the whole way if we had tried to do our normal pace.
The terrain was beautiful! The leaves are changing, so there was color everywhere. Running in Flagstaff always brings back a lot of memories, from high school cross country runs, to training for my first marathon, to falling down in the dark 6 weeks before my first marathon and having to skip it, etc. I did a lot of challenging trail runs when I lived here. Once I ran up Snowbowl Road and back down. Fun stuff!
My body feels like it went 20 miles! |