6.3

Coming to the finish of the "longest run ever" two thoughts went through my mind 1) holy crap, I just ran 6.3 miles and, 2) how the heck am I ever going to run 13.1 miles when I just made this run?!! Then I reminded myself of the first time "Holly" made us run for 5 minutes and before we started I thought, how the heck am I ever going to run for 5 whole minutes? (you see we were jumping up from 3 to 5 - that seemed like a huge jump.) I look back at the end of that first five minute run when I thought, I can't believe I did it, AND that it was actually easier to run five straight minutes than it was to stop and start constantly. So will running 7 miles be easier than 6? Will 8 be easier than 7? Will 13.1 be easier than 12? From 6.3 looking at 13.1 it's hard to imagine it could ever be easy but then I remind myself to just take one step at a time, to keep putting one foot in front of the other. And I keep moving forward.

Today's run was relatively kind, I assume because it was our longest. We crossed the Southgate bridge into Ohio then hit our first and only real hill of the run. Up Eggleston to Central where we were either running through the relatively flat streets of downtown or downhill toward the river. The route was quite scenic / historic passing several Cincinnati landmarks including the Tyler Davidson Fountain on the Square, the Taft Theater, the P&G Buildings, several old churches and the Bengals practice field. I like to savor the sights and often see things I've never experienced before. Last weekend we ran past several wooly mammoth statues on a run up Gest Street. Who knew there were wooly mammoths on Gest? My guess is they used to be in front of the Natural History Museum when it was over on Gilbert. We crossed back into Kentucky on the Clay Bailey Bridge. There's a train trestle crossing the river next to this bridge. I kind of love when a train is crossing with me. I pretend to use the power of the train to pull me along. Today the train was going in the opposite direction - I "hopped on board" anyway.

For most of this run I had lost my coaches. I was nervous about my pace since I didn't know where my coaches were, and for the better part of the last 2.5 miles I thought they were way ahead of me and that I was going to be the last person back to the Spot. (Mind you, I never looked back to confirm this suspicion.) Which would have been strange because these coaches are pretty certain not to leave anyone in their dust. I just kept chugging along until I touched base at the Spot. I mentally congratulated myself, stretched for 3-5 minutes then headed back to my car which was back in the direction I had just run from. And there I found my coaches - bringing in the end I the pack. I stood there for a minute then gave a big cheer for them. I think my coaches might have thought I was giving myself that cheer as they called out "good job".

Heck, who am I kidding... It was for me too. I had just run 6.3 miles! That's a 10k!