Trail Running

It's no secret that I frequent the gym on a regular basis, as many days a week as I can swing it.  Usually I spend my time in the actual gym facility doing all sorts of silly things like lifting lots of very heavy things, or playing on some of the equipment that tests my balance skills (which, for the record, are horrible).  It has it's moments, and I work out with a trio of other lovely ladies so it can be quite fun, and a fairly good way to kill a morning. On occasion I get out and go for a run. Today was such a day.

There is a (mostly) paved path that starts at the Y and ends at a park way out in Round Rock 7 or 8 miles away.  I have biked the whole trail from end to end and back again, run and/or walked large sections of it.  It's very pretty, winding past big fields that are currently full of wildflowers, past several parks, by a little lake, very nice path.  But, it's mostly flat.  And flat running can be just ridiculously tedious and boring, too easy to watch the distance markers every quarter mile seem to get further and further apart.  The real beauty of this path is the miles and miles and miles of trails that break off and wind through the woods all along the path.  So every now and then my little workout group goes out and runs the trails.  Up and down hills, rocky paths, along creek beds, and on and on and on.

The thing about running along the trails is it is very easy to lose track of the distance.  That can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on how you look at it.  Thinking of running any distance on the flats is mentally draining before the run even starts.  The trails, it's fun.  Today we ended up running just over 6 miles in about an hour.  The bad part about the trails is you get on one and by the time you are really tired of it and ready for a break you realize you are just past the halfway point and have no choice but to keep plugging away until it breaks out of the woods and back to the paved path.  Turning back is generally longer and harder then plugging on.

Anyway, here are a few pictures from todays run.