Hello friends!
I’m back in Chapel Hill and had a great rest of the weekend in Pittsburgh. In addition to eating lots of delicious food, relaxing, watching movies, and socializing, I also got a great run in with Matt and my dad on Thanksgiving morning!
Blue skies in Pittsburgh?! Shock! We must have brought the Carolina Blue with us. 🙂
My parents were staying at a hotel in downtown Pittsburgh, so Matt and I decided to make the trek in to the city for our turkey trot after all — just later in the day. We made it down there for the run about 11:30 a.m. I was glad we waited — it was pretty cold and gray in the morning but by the time we arrived, the sun had burned off all the clouds.
My dad, Matt and I ended up running just over 6 miles. We headed over one of the many bridges and to a trail that went along the river. It was really pretty — although the lower trail that we were going to run on was totally flooded! I guess there’s been a lot of rain here lately. Luckily there was an upper trail that we were able to run on instead.
The first four miles of the run were ROUGH for me — my legs were really tired from the combination of yoga on Wednesday and standing at a bar until 1:30 a.m. on Wednesday night. Now I remember why running in college used to really suck. Too many late nights in heels! (Well, and hangovers… which luckily was not the problem on Thursday, just tired legs.)
My dad and Matt were ahead for most of the run (yes, I totally got left in the dust), but I ended up feeling better for the last 2 miles and catching up. I could totally tell that I’m trained for a half marathon (longer and slightly slower runs) vs. shorter and faster runs right now. I felt great by mile 5, just when we were nearly done!
Mile splits:
- Mile 1: 9:33 (trying to figure out where the trail had gone!)
- Mile 2: 8:36
- Mile 3: 8:52
- Mile 4: 8:51
- Mile 5: 9:16 (stop lights, etc. — back in the city)
- Mile 6: 8:52
Total distance: 6.06 miles. Total time: 54:29. Average pace: 9:00 min/miles… though this included wandering around trying to find the trail (that was underwater), so our pace when running was faster. 🙂
We stopped around mile 4 to take some pictures. Beautiful views!
Great run. Served well to peak our hunger before the epic feast later that day!
Exactly one week until the Vegas half marathon!!! Bring it, Vegas. I’m ready for you. 🙂
I just got back into town at midnight last night (stupid delayed flight out of Chicago — because flying through Chicago when trying to get from Pittsburgh to Raleigh makes so much sense…) and I’m heading back off to the airport now to pick up a college friend! She has a work even here in Chapel Hill later this week and is coming a couple days early to hang out. Yay. 🙂 We’re thinking of hitting the hiking trails later today — it’s a beautiful day here in NC!
