Trials on Trails

I had THE BEST run last night. The best run I’ve had in a long while.
They have been building a new trail out at Gilruth for the past few months and it finally opened a week or two ago. The original trail is an asphalt path through the trees along the back fence of the space center for the first 1.5 miles, which then turns into the paved, sloped shoulder of one of the main on-site roads for the remaining 1.4 miles of the 2.9 mile loop. The new trail departs from the old just before the 1.25 mile mark, and cuts behind some buildings before running along the road. However, it’s got a buffer of about 40 feet of grass between trail and cars, and the surface is level, crushed gravel like the Seabrook trails, so it’s much nicer to run on. The only problem is that it’s even shorter than the old trail — and the old one has always bugged me because it’s so close to — but not quite! — a nice, even 3 miles.
I ran two laps of the new trail last Saturday, but I didn’t have my Garmin with me so I had to estimate the distance at 5.3-5.5 miles for two laps, or about 2.7 miles per loop. This estimate was based on Google Pedometer, which was still inaccurate because the satellite view doesn’t show the new trail. Now, if you know me, you know that it makes me antsy to run without stats such as time and distance. So last night I decided to run the new trail with my Garmin and get a good measurement.
Old Trail vs. New Trail:

My Google Pedometer skills are apparently pretty darn good, because my Garmin measured the new trail at exactly 2.7 miles. They haven’t added mile markers to the new trail yet, and I don’t know if they ever will. The old one is marked every quarter mile, so I hope they will do the same, but you never can tell what the Gilruth Center can do. Even those of us who are regular runners out there didn’t know they were building a new trail until we saw it under construction!
Anyway, on to the run itself. I started out easy, because I arrived at Gilruth feeling tired and uninspired. I didn’t even really want to run at all, but I can only slack off so much and expect to finish the half ironman in one piece, so I knew I had to run, period. My running friend David caught up with me just past the half mile mark, and I talked to him until I reached the point where the new trail splits from the old. Mile 1 passed in just under 11:00, and mile 2 was just over 11:00. The next 0.7 passed in under 7:30, so my total average for the loop was just under 11:00 pace. Not too bad.
I knew I wanted to run at least 3 miles, but I was feeling good so I decided I’d run to the half mile mark and back to give me 3.7 total. But when I got to the half mile mark, I was feeling so good that I decided to continue to the mile mark before turning around, which would give me 4.7 total. I felt awesome. I ran at a comfortably hard tempo pace and that mile out and mile back passed in 10:25 and 9:57! Wow! Even after that last mile, I could have easily kept going. I was working hard, but at a level I could maintain. I was a little surprised to see the sub-10 because I thought I’d feel worse at that pace.
The run put me in a good mood for the rest of the evening. I didn’t end up going downtown to see Obama, but since CNN broadcast the entirety of his speech, I didn’t miss out.
I am crossing my fingers and toes for nice weather next weekend for the Texas Independence Relay. We’re almost enough that 10-day forecasts cover March 1-2 so I’m sure I’ll be obsessing about the potential weather from now on. Temperatures of 55-60 with a dew point of about 45 would be perfect. I think I might actually be able to live up to Jon’s hopes for my “speed” if the weather is good…