The Perfect Run

First, yes, I'm back at the run blogging. I didn't stop running, just gave this up for a long while. But no more. With the whole running group training for marathons together (Eugene, May 1) plus the new incentive at work where I get paid to exercise (no joke!), there's all kinds of fun running to share about.

So mid-morning, Christy dragged me out of the house to run at Waddell Creek. It's a decent drive up the coast to the trailhead. It's part of the Skyline to the Sea path that winds through several state parks in Santa Cruz and Santa Clara counties. In the past, I've only done this run as a 13-ish mile out-and-back to Berry Creek Falls, but today we ran shorter, about an hour.



It was gorgeous and muddy and sunny. The trail starts at the beach and heads up through some small farms. The fire road is all torn up this time of year from farm trucks, mountain bikers and the rain, so keeping my new shoes clean was not an option.

Lots of other people had Christy's same awesome idea and were out hiking the trail. Mostly couples, and none of them looked happy. (Probably because they weren't rocking out to the Dixie Chicks like I was!)

The first two miles or so just felt icky. I think it was because I took Coach Rod's advice to carb-load with beer last night. (We'll have to talk about that one later, Coach.) But once I got a little muddy, the run felt great.

There's a side trail that spurs from the fire road just after the ranger station and reconnects about 1.5 miles up the route. Taking the trail back seemed like nice way to mix things up, plus there'd been a lot of bikers and hikers to dodge and Christy claims the trail is less hilly on the return.

It's not. It's still really hilly.

You also have to be a little adventurous to get to the trail. There's a creek crossing that, when the water flow is low, is covered with a plank bridge. However, this time of year, the creek is up to a couple feet deep in some spots and the little bridge is leaned up a against a tree on the riverbank. Hikers were putting their boots back on when I jumped in and splashed across. (Cleaned the mud off my shoes that way.)

Christy, who was not running with me because she can run 11 miles in 32 minutes, or something really fast like that, did the same thing to the next group of hikers.

We finished the run with a romp in the ocean, my special "Dead Body Tour: North Coast Edition" and treats from Swanton Berry Farm. Sure, it took half the day to get in a 6.5-mile run, but it was totally worth. Callie is definitely jealous.

Race photos

So in case you're curious what last weekend's blazing hot trail half-marathon looked like, here are the photos. Check out a few of the shots to see how tinder-dry it was out there, the looks of pain and fatigue on people's faces, the ever-present (and mostly empty) water bottles .... it was brutal. The race director said we had record-high temps that day.

Somehow, all 375 people who started the three races (half marathon, 10K and 5K) finished. How cool is that?!?!?

"Fun" is a fourth-place finish

So it's like this: I kind of kick ass. Oh, and I'm tough.

Saturday was my freebie entry to a Brazen Racing trail run in Briones Regional Park, a hilly, sun-baked open space somewhere outside of Walnut Creek and Orinda in Contra Costa County. The plan was to have fun, not race.

Fun, in this case, is relative. Most would not consider running up and down rocky slopes under the blazing sun (it had to be 80 degrees at 8 a.m., and only got hotter) for nearly three hours fun. But once I got past the idea of clocking a fast time -- more than 2,800 feet of elevation gain over 13-plus miles knocked out that goal pretty fast -- I was able to relax and enjoy the experience.

Without mile paces to concern myself with (the first mile was 9:19, but then the hills started and I gave up watching the clock), I noticed a black butterfly and a grasshopper-like critter with red wings. I talked to the grazing cows and thanked the aid station volunteers who forced a water bottle into my hands at mile 6 and wrung out big sponges of ice water over my head at miles 9 and 12. Sometimes I sang aloud (sorry to anyone who overheard me), greeted hikers and encouraged other runners, mostly as I passed by their pained, sweat-drenched faces. I even stopped to use an outhouse with about 1.5 miles left.

And for this race, I carried a map because it was a Brazen Racing event where I got lost (and exceedingly frustrated) earlier this year. It was a "just in case" move, and luckily, something I never needed. However, I did glance down sometimes to see when the next aid station would appear on the horizon. The blue pop-up tents were a welcome relief from the heat. (It was so hot, I downed two 16-ounce water bottles and about 10 Dixie cups of liquid during the race.)

When the finish finally snuck up on me I was walking up three mild switchbacks (walking the hills was the only way to survive this course). Then bam! The finish line was 100 feet away. After all of the hills and heat, I actually felt like I could grind out a few more miles at that point. The extreme conditions had given way to a rolling-single track, mostly shaded trail. But instead, an announcer read my name and someone handed me a shiny medal.

Really, I was glad to be done. My time was somewhere around 2:40, that is 2 hours and 40 minutes, much slower than I'd predicted and a far cry from my personal best of 1:54. But I didn't care. It was for fun. So I picked up my sweet shirt and the pretty-rockin' goody bag (a reusable grocery bag from BareNaked granola with lots of neat swag in it), spent a few minutes sitting in the shade, then headed out with Kendall and Callie the dog to get burgers and cokes at the In and Out in Oakland.

Only today did I look up my race results.

Sure, my mile pace was nothing to write home about (12:14 a mile), but I was 24th of 84 half marathon finishers (35 of whom were women). That put me third of seven women in my age group and ... drum roll please ... the fourth woman overall!

And I had fun.

So I'm kind of a bad ass, at least when it comes to trail running in harsh conditions. Now, if you try to break into my house, I might scream bloody murder and cower in the corner, but that's a whole 'nother story.

A nice thing .... and I feel like a brat

So awhile back I wrote a little something here blasting the Nitro Trail Half Marathon, which I ran with Sarah in May, because I got lost on the poorly marked course, missed two miles and lost out on a personal-best. The rant (which wasn't even that severe) was really meant for the likes of Mom and a few friends, but through the magic of the Interweb, the race director (Sam) found it.

He e-mailed me this week to apologize.

"I'm really sorry that happened to you and I'm really sorry that you thought I had no compassion for your getting lost -- I actually felt horrible that anyone got off course. Things definitely got a bit disorganized and confusing, especially for the faster runners like you. It won't ever be that way again. I hope you at least liked the shirt and had some fun running there."

And then offered me a free race entry into one of his other events. Brazen Racing puts on something like four races a year, all in the East Bay not far from where Sarah lives in Oakland.

"I can assure you that all of those races will be much easier to follow."

I feel a little embarrassed for bad-mouthing Sam's race, but I'm really impressed by the way he responded. So I'll probably take him up on the offer and try another course, maybe even rope Sarah into running with me -- or in front of me, as the case may be.

And Sam's right about one thing. I wear the shirt all the time.

Trail dance

Callie has been having a ball lately. The lucky pup has gone running nearly every day for the past week and she's loving it!

Last night we went for what should have been a quick'n'easy jaunt on the trails behind my house. It was my "break" after running six of the past seven days, including a 12.6-mile hilly trail run Monday morning. Plus I had 6 a.m. run plans with Leslie today.

So Callie and I set off with some music (for me) and less than 90 minutes of daylight left. We ran the standard 30-minute out-and-back trail, but went up the hill instead of turning back. We zipped through the golf course (I "flew" down the hills with my arms spread wide) all the while rocking out to my special mix of chick country music, Lily Allen and the like, 90s alternative rock hits and my sister's mixed CDs from Guatemala. God, we had fun!


We dropped into the park side of the Delaveaga trails and headed back toward the trailhead singing aloud. There weren't that many people out (by now it was almost 8 p.m.) so I wasn't too worried about embarrassing myself. Sure, some people did double-takes, but I couldn't hear them over my music and off-key, out-of-breath singing.

Callie trotted along just fine, occasionally darting after a bird only to find she was still attached to a leash and therefore unable to lunge far enough to catch her prey. She got a bit tired when I doubled back down a trail to add time (because a 40 minute easy run wasn't enough) but I sang to her and we did a little jig in the early twilight the tree canopy provided.

Eventually, we made it out of the forest and back into the neighborhood. After a quick stop at the dog park for water and a bathroom break (for Callie, really) we sprinted the last four blocks home and Callie got a nice kibble dinner with turkey burger drippings. All told, it was a 55-minute run, which I'm hoping was about 6ish miles (I felt like we were bookin' it!).



She was fully recovered in time for the morning run with Leslie today. I wasn't quite as well off, but I started chugging coconut water at Mom's suggestion and it's a great, natural sports drink. I'm hooked.

Sunday morning hangover cure

With the taste of Seabright Brewery ale still on my tongue, I reluctantly set off with my friend Scotty for a long, easy run in Big Basin State Park on Sunday morning. My goodness! It is the perfect time of year to enjoy this trail. Even with a hangover, I had a great time (well, once I worked all that beer out of my system and then until I ran out of water toward the end) and loved the views of Berry Creek Falls, our turnaround point on the out-and-back run.

You can pick up the trail at Waddell Beach, which is on Highway 1 near the county line, or up at park headquarters outside of Boulder Creek. We opted for the former, which means the run to the waterfall is about six miles if you stick to the bike- and horse-friendly dirt fire road. Pretty quickly, the trail finds the creek, then follows the water up. You cross several bridges -- one that's just two steel I-beams cabled to the rocks -- and climb a few steep hills along the way. The fire road gives way to single-track trail about a mile from the falls and those last few hundred meters just fly by.

It's hard to not linger at the falls, a 70-foot (ish) drop that is arguably one of the prettiest waterfalls on the California Coast. The viewing platform has a nice bench and some rails (perfect for stretching) and on Sunday there were a few hikers passing through to chat with. But staying too long under the dense redwood canopy chills you, as we found out Sunday.

Making our way back down, it seemed like we breezed down the dirt path -- probably thanks to the slight decline and caffeine fix (Espresso Love Gu). Things were fine until I decided to stop and pee in the bushes. I spotted a little lizard who seemed friendly (he was watching me squat!) so I picked him up to show Scotty. Halfway back to the trail, the little guy bit my thumb! I "accidentally" flung him into the bushes.



The lizard wasn't the only interesting wildlife we encountered. We saw monarchs flap past and watched little fish flick around in the crystal-clear stream. There are a couple of ag fields early in the run, which gave way to lush green forest and fields of tiny baby-blue wildflowers.

Near the beginning of the fire road, there is a trail that loops off of it for hikers, I suppose to give them a reprieve from the bikes and horses. We hadn't taken this on the way out, but decided to come back on it. I'd never been up that way before and didn't know that, with my waterbottle bone dry and the sun starting to blaze down a bit (sorry, 80 degrees is hot!) we were again climbing hills, these ones baked in golden sunshine.

More than once, I stopped to walk. I felt like a huge wimp, especially with Scotty jetting in front of me while playing tour guide (ex: "these are trees"). But he put up with my exhaustion -- this was my longest run since the marathon two weeks prior -- and even pushed me up a hill.

We descended right to Horse Camp, car-camping spot about a half-mile in from the beach, and filled our water bottles from the newly installed water pump before finishing out the run and jumping in the 55-degree ocean. It took us just a bit more than two hours, so I'm guessing it was about a 13-mile trek.


Our reward for running -- and the sole topic of conversation during the last few miles of our run -- were burgers and cold drinks (Coke and juice, not beers) at the Davenport Bakery, Bar and Grill. Yum! Food tastes so much better after a good workout!

And then I went home to nap.

Good day

There's nothing like yanking yourself out of a warm bed in the pre-dawn hours for a morning run.

In that moment when the alarm (or, in my case, phone call from Mom) shocks you from your pleasant slumber and into the cold morning, going for a run is the last thing you want to do. It never feels good to peel off the blankets and stumble through the darkness to tug on shorts, a long sleeve and your stinky running shoes.

More sleep always seems like the better options. For me, this usually wins out unless I'm meeting someone for an easy 5-mile jaunt. But when there's someone waiting for me (and Callie, as exercising her is another big motivator) I can usually suck it up and get out the door.

The amazing thing about it is I always feel better after a before-work run. The day goes better and I'm more productive at work. I might be a bit tired and jittery from coffee (which seems to have more of a kick post-run), but I'm also happier.

So today -- even with its intermittent rain showers, fatal car crash and never-ending gang project interviews -- is great because Callie and I roused ourselves at 5:40 a.m., met Leslie for a 6 a.m. run on Pleasure Point and slogged through the rain for about 40 minutes.

The point? Get out there. It's worth it. You can always nap later.