My first 5k trail run

Today was my first 5k trail run as you may have guessed from my title.

Let me start out by saying running 3 miles on a treadmill is nowhere near the same as running it on a trail, even a flat dirt trail.

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I woke up about 2 hours earlier than I normally did to beat the afternoon heat. There have been many times that I planned on waking up earlier to get my workout in before it gets really hot but I never seem to make it out of bed. Just getting out of bed early was quite the accomplishment! Before I run I like to have a cup of coffee and an english muffin with cream cheese. I have found this to be the best fuel for my runs. I try to leave an hour to eat and then digest the food before I leave for my runs. Today was no different.

I was a little worried about my dog this morning. I knew she would love the run but she has been acting a little funny the past few days, all she wants to do is sleep in her crate. She got out of bed with me though and was quite curious what I was doing up so early. I told her that if she would eat some of her food I would take her for a run and it actually worked!!

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The trail I run is marked every half a mile and today I wondered if I could make it to the next marker at everyone I encountered. I made sure that I ran super slow and I tried to keep my heart rate in the same place that it is when I am on the treadmill. I had always thought of my trail as flat until today. I could feel the unevenness in my steps as my body stabilized it's self. I started today not really knowing how far I would run. I knew I wanted to run 3 miles and walk some when I was done running. When I got close to the two mile marker I was pretty sure I would turn around, run one more mile and walk one, decent but really my worst case scenario. I got to the marker and I just kept pushing on. This happened at every single half mile but still I kept on going. As I came up still running on the three mile marker I knew that I had hit my goal and was ready to turn around and walk the three miles back! My walk back was slower than normal but great. I even ran a little bit of it.

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My dog did great all 6 miles. She really loves being out there and I can't tell you the looks we get since she is so small.

This was taken on our way to the trail one day. She how excited she is?

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I have made the decision to not weigh myself until I have finished my first race. I have learned to love running and for me I don't run to lose weight. I hopefully will lose some as a nice bonus but it isn't what keeps me going. I will still be counting points but my mindset has shifted to fueling my body so that I can run.