5K Mountain Prep

Time:  30 minutes
Distance:  3.02 miles
Location:  Yucca Loma to Rincon

Well, it's been too long.  I last ran on June 4th.  Last week was busy because it was the last week of school and I was preoccupied with wrapping things up with my classes.  Plus I volunteered to chaperone grad night, which meant losing a whole night of sleep Thursday night.  It took me a few days to recover from that, but once I did I got lazy and missed a couple of good opportunities to run.  Tonight, though, I could not afford to miss.  Tomorrow I am heading up to Lake Arrowhead to meet Scott and spend a couple of days getting some high-altitude runs in.  Those runs are going to be tough and I didn't want to go up there without preparing at all.  So tonight I forced myself out on a run.  I also pushed myself to do 30 minutes instead of the usual 20-25 minutes.  I decided to do the Yucca Loma run since it has a nice hill to climb (good training for the mountains).  And I went all the way to Rincon, since lately I've been turning back sooner than that.  But I used to be able to run out to Rincon and back to our house in under 30 minutes.  It was not so today.  I made it almost all the way.  30 minutes was up right as I was heading back down Coachella.  But when I mapped out the route I was surprised to see that I actually hit the 3 mile mark (3.02 to be exact).  3 miles in 30 minutes is not exactly stellar, but I at least felt pretty good on the run.  I was worried about that since it had been 9 days since my last run.  But as soon as I set out my body felt great.  That good feeling lasted me almost the entire run, until the very end.  For some reason, as I ran the last stretch of the route my left calf muscle started tightening up, almost like I was pulling it.  It forced me to slow down and adjust my form.  Luckily after I stopped running the pain went away, but it was worrisome all the same.  I hope it doesn't happen again tomorrow.

I'm looking forward to my next two runs.  Our goal in Arrowhead is to get in some trail running.  Hopefully that elevation will help to strengthen our lungs and increase our endurance.  We only have just over 2 weeks to go until the 5k after all!