Sweet 16

Last week I mentioned that I had a new PDR of 14 miles, this week however I upped it again to 16 miles.  That's right 16 long sweaty miles.

I woke up at 4:45 am so I could be on time in Katy at 5:30 AM to start the run.  I was about 2 minutes away when I saw this guy in the middle of the street on the phone and a black Mercedes stuck to a light pole.  I have always been taught if you see an accident or you pass a scene of an accident without police or an ambulance you need to stop and help.  I turned around to make sure the guy was OK and to see if I could help in any way.  It turns out that the guy was just running by (he was on a 21 mile training run also) and he saw the accident and stopped too.  The police were already on their way but I didn't want to leave until they got there just in case.  When the police got there they made the girl (who was no more than 25) get out of the car and she was drunk as a skunk.  She had been sitting in the passenger side of the vehicle and had no idea where she was or anything, she looked like she had been partying all night.  Oh, and did I mention that the Mercedes was brand new with paper tags?! WTH?  I despise drunk drivers!  Grr!!!  Anyway, once the cop got there we asked if we needed to stay since neither of us had seen anything, the cops took our info just in case but we were free to go.  I wished the guy good luck on his run and he wished me the same.

I was about 5 minutes late meeting with my group since I stopped to help, but they hadn't left the parking lot yet.  We all left at the same time, but the faster group pulled ahead and us slow pokes followed behind.  I stayed with the 10.5-11 minute mile group for about 5 miles, but when I stopped to take some GU and drink water they pulled away and I couldn't catch back up.  It was ok thought because I don't think I would have made it the entire 16 miles going that fast (that is fast for me!).  The 16 mile course we went on was a big loop all around the Cinco Ranch area, and also around the big lake off of Spring Green.

Our group leader Alain was at miles 4.5, 8, and 16 to make sure we didn't need anything.  Around mile 3 I got sprayed by a water sprinkler, and when I say sprayed I mean SOAKED!  It felt good since I was getting hot by mile 3, but I literally had to ring out the water from my shirt. haha. When I saw Alain at Mile 5 he gave me a Snickers mini bar (Halloween fun size) for extra energy, and also I had one (or two!) at mile 8.  Also at mile 8 there was a water station set up so I could refill my water belt. I thought Alain had said he would be at the gas station on Cinco Ranch also, but he just went back to the parking lot where we started (it was one big 16 mile loop). 

Around mile 13 I wasn't sure when we turn left, the map he gave us didn't have a street name but with the help of another runner (not in our group) and a random bicyclist I was pretty sure I made the correct turn (but even if I didn't, I didn't care...I wanted to be done!).  I made it to mile 15 and Alain was waiting for me in the parking lot to give me my keys back.  He said he would wait for me to finish my last mile around the lake, but I told him to go ahead and leave and I could finish the last mile by myself since he probably had stuff to do and I was the last one to finish (a lot of our group was only doing 12 miles and the faster 16 mile people had already gotten done).

When I saw Alain at mile 5 he said that when he made the schedule he accidentally put today's run as a 16 mile run, but it should have been 12.  I figured since I had already psyched myself up to do 16 miles that I should go ahead and finish what I came to do.  I don't know what I am going to do when I have to do another 10 miles on top of that 16!  16 almost killed me!  I was soooo tired the last 3 miles.

Afterwards I drank some chocolate milk, ate some nuts and pretzels, then headed home to shower.  I got out of my car and was walking very slowly and I thought 'I don't think that even if I wanted to I could walk faster' but then I thought, 'Well, if a zombie acpolypse happened I could probably go a bit faster.'  Luckily though, there were no zombies and I made it inside safely to take a shower.  I needed to go to my parents house in Spring that day, but I took about a 45 minute nap first then headed out that direction.  The rest of the day I spent in Spring hanging out with my family and resting.  I did end up taking another 2 hour nap at my parents house this afternoon.  So tired.

Sweet 16 baby!!  Let's give it a few weeks before I do that again!