Insanely beautiful day today. Absolutely crazy beautiful.
So I slipped on the shoes and shorts before jumping in the car for the ride home, and cranked out a run. My bright idea was that I’d run out easy for 11 minutes, then turn around and pick up the pace for the way home. Really stretch it out to see if I could drop 2 minutes off the leg time and get in in 20 minutes.
Off I go. Highlight of the run was not getting attacked by geese this time, but was seeing the new cadets arrive at NAPS. Nothing like a little standard issue “orientation” to bring back memories of Drill Instructor Staff Sergeant Hyler, United States Marine Corps, and get my left foot hitting the ground. (ran a 9:30 mile and a half after 4 months with him) Warmed my heart.
I turn around in front of the NAPS building, and “kick it into high gear”. Truthfully, I felt great on the way back, until my heart rate pegged about 1/2 mile away from the car. Slowed down a little bit, but figured out I’d still cut a minute or so off based on perceived effort and that this side of the run was more downhill.
So what did the clock tell me? 21:45. Dropped a whopping 15 seconds on the trip back in.
Sigh.