One with Nature!!!

This morning I met up with Coach Nikon at the foot bridge in Old Fair Oaks. Once again we were both early, but before we could start our run Coach had to change his shirt. You see I was wearing a orange sleeveless shirt with grey shorts and white hat and will Coach was wearing the exact same color shirt and shorts. Twins!!! Can't have that!!!! He changed into a grey shirt and we both had a good laugh about the situation. (next time send memo out with wardrobe the night before) When we arrived there was no one in the parking lot, it was empty, but when we returned from the run it was completely full. We had decided we would do a timed run instead of miles which was fine by me. We decided upon 2 hours and 30 minutes.
At the start of the run I was feeling tight but that tightness slowly faded and my legs began to feel great and both Coach and I feel into a nice steady rhythm. We were just chit chatting away, talking about what we always do, which is everything besides running because we save the running conversations for when we are not running. We headed out towards Hazel and cruised along staying on the bike path and crossed over and went up the hazel bridge and than as we were going we came across a huge herd (I guess you would call it that) of geese. They were literally sitting on the bike path, in the dirt, in the rocks and as we approached didn't move. So we had to find a path and run through them. Strangest thing I every did see.

Not actual picture, but you get the idea.

We took the fire road and than took some trails only to find out the trail was overgrown with weeds up to your waist and you could hardly see the trail. As we were running on the trail I rolled my ankle again. This nagging little injury is going to haunt me for awhile. We immediately decided to connect back up with the fire road because we didn't want to have hives again like last weekend. We were making really good timing because pretty soon we realized we needed to turn around. We had been running for 1 hr 15 min and made it 7.5 miles. Not bad, we were both just enjoying the run not pushing to hard and not going to easy.
We turned around and headed back in. As we headed back in a bug flew in my eye and I stopped but Coach not realizing what happened kept running and I think he was talking when he noticed I stopped. Dang bug!!!!
After the bug incident we crossed back over Hazel and he stopped to get a drink of water and I kept going when out of no where a nut/rock (not sure what it was) came sliding down the tree crossed the bike path and just missed me by a step. I hear Coach saying "Nature does not like you today" he stopped to check out the tree and in that tree was a squirrel.

This is how I pictured the squirrel

 Really a squirrel throwing things at me. Oh well, what can I do about it. As we moved on this time a bug flew into Coach's eye. When he got the bug out it was still alive and flew away. Guess Nature is after him too.
Immediately following the "Bug Incident" I was cruising along when all of sudden I had these sharp stomach pains. I thought to myself I can run through this. Only it wasn't getting better, it was getting worse. I told Coach I needed to walk, my stomach had me doubled over. I had eaten some oatmeal that morning but Coach thought maybe I was empty. I honestly don't know what happened because in just a few minutes the pain passed and was just a dull ache and we were able to run again. That hasn't happened to me where I was doubled over in pain. Something to keep my eye on as I continue training.
With a herd of crazy geese, 2 bugs in the eye, one nut rolling squirrel, stomach pain that stops me in my tracks, I would say we had a solid run. I was very grateful that Coach called last night to see what I had planned. The great thing about running with Coach is you forget about everything that has been going in your life and you remember how much fun running is. I was feeling like crap on my last run but today my spirits were high and I was enjoying running again. In two weeks I will be running in the Western States Training run of 32 miles. I think I am ready and I just have to remember to run a steady pace and to enjoy the experience.