#mastersxcrunner

Late post on the past weekend’s race. I’ve been focusing on 5Ks as a way to rebuild not just fitness but also confidence. And this was the last race of my mini fall 5K season. I ran the first one back on October 3. After running a 25:01 in a road 5K two weeks ago, I was hoping maybe I would have some old XC magic in me and - and just maybe break 25. But it didn’t quite work out that way. I had some morning GI issues and the emergency POJ stop cut into my warmup time. I put my singlet on and hustled down to the start as quickly as I could but still was about a minute late. I quickly put my foot on the timing mat and took off. The first mile felt good and fast, but in Mile 2 either the lack of warmup time or the stomach distress put me off, and I just couldn’t find a better gear.

I have a rest day scheduled tomorrow though I’ll be plenty active coaching our cross country team in its district championship meet. Postseason is on!

Running check-in from yesterday. I decided to head over to the park where our championship meet is this Wednesday. I figured as the coach maybe I should run it, and ended up doing so twice. I ran it easy the first time and then picked up my effort and the second pass. My pace wasn’t fast but I felt good so I’ll take that.

I followed that up with a recovery day today in the pool. I put on my aqua jogger belt and got in the deep water and plodded along for 48 minutes. I learned a while ago that if you set the Garmin to treadmill run you can even get credit for some distance, in this case 3.4 miles. That’s much more than I covered in actual nautical distance - pool running is painfully slow - but I think it’s a reasonaabe measurement of the effort. I also did 15 minutes of sauna time - 15 minutes sitting in 190° is quite something.

Cold reality check this morning. This was a very tough XC course and I already knew that. So I don’t think I can take much from the result or use it as true benchmark. But wow, was I slow. Actually I felt good the first mile but then the legendary hills kicked in, and kicked my ass.

But I’m not beating myself up about it. At age 61, I am grateful anytime I can lace them up and get out there. I’ve been through multiple health challenges and surgeries the last few years and those have all taken a toll. I’m pretty sure a lot of other folks would have hung the shoes up by now, but I’m not wired that way.