Running from DCA

Posted on October 8, 2012. Filed under: Uncategorized |

I went to Vermont this weekend to celebrate the wedding of my dear friends Sarah and Chris – will recap in much greater detail in another post.

We went up to Burlington on Friday morning and all week last week I could not figure out when to do my long run for the weekend. Finally at work on Thursday, I thought: Hey – what if I just run home from the airport once we land on Sunday afternoon! It sounded crazy, but I talked to the aforementioned Meredith (the 22 miler!) and when she didn’t fully balk at the idea, I figured it wasn’t too crazy. I would just dress in my running gear – plus some layers because it was chilly in Vermont and then once I got to DCA I could shed some of those layers, put on my race belt and head in the direction of home…on foot.

Luckily for me, I was traveling with Justin, so I had a ready made person to tote home my bags for me, thank you Justin!

I was worried that it might be raining when we landed and I knew I’d call the whole thing off if that was the case. It was not raining, just overcast and a little chilly. I put Justin in a cab and then I set off. I had my trusty camelbak water bottle with me and didn’t want to run sans water, but have to say it was a real pain in the butt to run 10 miles with this thing. I will not do that again.

Somehow I busted out the first mile in 7:30. I still do not believe that I was moving that quickly or it’s possible my legs were just happy to be off the plane and moving again. I don’t know for sure, what I do know is that it did make my average per mile pace a respectable 9:35.

The last few miles were uphill and were all in the 10:30 range and pretty miserable, but I got to my hood and cranked out the last mile on the home stretch and couldn’t believe I really made it! I stopped in at Whole Foods to grab a chocolate milk and a bottle of pinot for dinner and the wine guy was like what did you just run 15-20 miles, I was like no 10. He was shocked that I came right into Whole Foods for some wine post race, but hey it was a necessity!

This picture doesn’t deserve it’s very own post, but because I’m still so proud of my creation, I’m going to give it some play here.