Springtime in Jersey

I have a tradition of running on every holiday possible, even if it is one I don't really celebrate. Easter is no exception, and boy was the weather gorgeous. I remember last Easter because it was chilly and really windy and I took my nieces to the park in their spring dresses and they whined because they were cold. So this Easter there were no kids at my mom's, no whining and my hubby wasn't stuck at work- score. The sunshine drew me out of bed with the promise of a nice, easy run. Earlier in the week I'd planned for about 10 miles on Sunday, but then I ended up doing close to 9 on my group run Saturday, so I settled for 6. I hadn't taken a day off since the previous Saturday and I'm not training for anything specific right now, so why overtrain?

There's something to be said for familiarity in a route. There isn't anything exciting or even interesting about the routes near my Mom's house, in fact, they are flat and I have to run on the sidewalk...aka boring. I usually listen to podcasts (This american life, Dump Runners Club or Wait, Wait Don't Tell me) to keep me entertained, but this time I was dumb and didn't update before I left home so I was stuck with what I had. I decided to pull a TK and listen to an alphabetized list of songs, I picked the letter "A" and went from there.

The run started out easy at an 8:43 pace as I cruised over the only visible hill in the entire county along quiet Vermont Ave. My legs were excited by the music and wanted to speed up a bit, but I could tell that they were a little heavy and I decided to hold the pace around 8:30 for the run. As I neared a giant church I knew I would encounter chaos and as I turned the corner, the usual Sunday traffic was quadrupled. I loped on past the cars waiting in line to get to church, feeling lots of eyes on my back. There are not a ton of runners on the streets around here. I turned the corner away from the church, feeling no guilt for not being there and continued on my way. I passed Amy Ct, smiled, and kept going. It was around mile 4 that I hit the headwind that always plagues my NJ runs on the way back to Mom's. The wind here is perpetually a NW wind, so much so that a horse farm along my route renamed itself "West Wind Stables". Yes, there are horses at the Jersey shore. I pushed through the headwind, happy that it wasn't a cold wind, and made my way back home. My legs were heavy by the end and I was looking forward to eating the marshmallow bunnies I left on the table. It wasn't anything stellar, but I pushed through a run that had no underlying purpose and got in a solid 6 miles and I really enjoyed the "A" playlist.

The Numbers:
6.0mi, 51:32
avg pace 8:36
pace per mi:
8:43
8:32
8:32 (pacemaster's apprentice)
8:43 (it was slow going by the traffic-no sidewalk)
8:29
8:31

This run was brought to you by the letter "A":
"Acoustic #3" by Goo Goo Dolls, "Ain't no reason" by Brett Dennen, "Ain't no rest for the wicked" by Cage the Elephant, "Alejandro" by Lady GaGa, "All About Soul" by Billy Joel, "All Dressed in Love" SATC soundtrack-Jennifer Hudson, "All I ever wanted" by Train, "All I hear" by Train, "All I really want" by Alanis Morissette (annoyed me a little), "All In" by Lifehouse, "All that I'm asking for" by Lifehouse, "All that matters" by Addison Road, "All this beauty" SATC soundtrack by The Weepies, and cooldown walk to "Allentown" by Billy Joel. It was really good stuff :) Totally random.