Kennedy Park to CC Mall and Back - 14

I drove over to Kennedy Park (just off Parker and 225 behind the softball fields) and ran from there toward downtown today. I wanted to get in 14 miles at an easy pace. Jill was doing a long training run for Boston (24 miles) and I wanted to meet her on the way back and run back with her at her pace. She left at 8:00 this morning, so we figured if I left at 10:00, I'd meet her about 7 miles into my run near Cherry Creek Mall and that's how it worked out.



It was cold today, 20 degrees at 8:00 and only about 25 at 10:00 with the high predicted for 33. Light snow flurries, but it didn't last long. I started off about an 8:15 pace and sped up under 8 after I warmed up. The Cherry Creek Trail is a neat trail that runs through the city basically along cherry creek, there's only a couple of places you have to cross the street, mostly underpasses, so you can get into a pace and just hold it. I am familiar with it because in the past I have run home from work or ridden by bike to and from work along it. I stopped about 4 miles into it to take a porta potti break near a rec center off Cherry Drive before Monaco. This was the first porta potti I could find (none at the start) and I really had to go bad. TMI? Anyway a slight detour and I was on my way.



I ran up past Colorado and I saw this car wash that Jill always talks about stopping to refill her water bottle. I had not noticed it before but was looking for it and It's huge, how did I miss that? This route is also kinda neat because I drive along the path some on my way to work in the mornings some days and it's nice to see it from a different perspective.



I was almost at CC Mall near where the CC Sneak starts and I saw Jill running towards me. She was about 17 miles into a 24 mile long run and she looked strong. I was about 6.75 on my Garmin, just short of 7 so turning around here would have put me short of 14. We chatted a few seconds and I told her I was going to run to 7 and then turn around and catch up to her when she stopped for water at the car wash. So we passed each other and I sped up a bit to about a 7:30 mile, went just past the bridge on the south side of the mall and turned around. Just as I got to path near the car wash I saw Jill running ahead. I realized I was really hungry and had not taken any GU and I was at about 7 1/2 miles, over an hour. So I stopped and had some GU and took off, finally caught her about 8 miles into my run.



From there we ran her pace and chatted about her run and other stuff going on in our lives, I took out my mp3 earphones but as usual she kept hers in as we chatted. It was nice and had warmed up just a bit with the sun peaking out. Jill was running strong and we were holding about a 9 minute pace. She said she felt really good. When we got to about Illiff she picked up the pace and we were doing about 8:30, she was running really strong 22 miles into her long run. I was suprised how well she was running that deep into a long run. The last mile we backed off a bit and relaxed. The final half mile is tough because there is a huge hill back to the start of the route. I thought about Mountain runing and how Mt. Evans or Pikes Peak or Guanella have miles of uphill relentless and how it takes me a while to get to where I can run those, made me wish late spring/summer was here and I was in the mountains running

14 Miles 2:00:42

Garmin Watch Data for Run

It's Valentines Day and my daughter Brittany (17 Sr. at Smoky Hill High School), got a surprise outside her window this morning from her boyfriend Trevor. He called her early and told her to look out her window at sunrise. Click on the image to make it larger, I took it through the screen with my phone, so not the best quality.