A Good Morning Full Of Hurt

Happened to be at Fairmont this weekend.  Called Ray and Nicole to say hi - and the first words out of Nicole's mouth was "hey, we're doing a workout tomorrow - wanna come?"  Well, couldn't pass up a chance to run a few miles with Nicole, Jeff Braun, Michelle Bazanella and Marvin Speece now could I?

So, showed up this morning at the designated spot on a dirt road East of Opportunity.  Ray and Marv had shuttled some vehicles so that we had the wind at our backs.  The road was soft dirt and gravel and everyone was bright and cheery.  We started off at a nice, easy pace with easy banter and all seemed good in the running world.

Then, I made the mistake of asking:  so, Nicole.  What is the workout plan for today?  So, the words coming out of her mouth:  30:00 warm-up, then 5 times:  1 mile at 10K pace, 1:00 rest, 400 at 5K pace, 3:00 rest, then cool down to Racetrack.  Probably about 13 to 14 miles total.  Now, those were the words that came from her mouth; but, all that I could hear were the words of Clubber Lange in Rocky III.  "My prediction.............................PAIN."

And Clubber was right.  I felt like Rocky in the first fight - taking shot after shot to the ribs and kidneys.  By round 3, I was in some pain.  In fact, was thinking that backing off was starting to sound like a good idea.  But, then - I remembered a post I made a while ago.  The general essence of that post was that I had, more or less, forgotten how to go to the well and make it hurt.  That had been something that had come about after missing an extended period of time when I fractured my patella a little less than 2 years ago.  That's when I realized that it was time to "cowboy up".  What better time than the present to start reversing the trend and to start making pain my friend once again.

So, I went to my personall happy place and settled into a rythm and buckled down to the business of the last 2 repeat sets.  And, yeah - it hurt.  But, it was great.  Pounding out a hard workout was a great way to spend a Sunday morning.  And, doing it with a great bunch of folks made it even better.  The topping on the cake was when I held up through the workout and pushed through even when it would have been easy to back off and drop off the pace.

As an added bonus, go to see first hand how hard the Continental Divide crew actually trains.  No wonder why they do so well at MT Cup.  And, seeing Nicole in action is always a treat.  Just a bit under a month from her move up into the master's crowd and she is going to se the 40+ crowd on fire.  She appears to be in great shape and I see her doing some big things this year at races like Bloomsday, the mountain running circuit, etc. 

So, thanks to the Pissers and Moaners for hosting me for a great Sunday morning.

See the rest of you on the roads, tracks and trails

The Muddy Buzzard