Team Gab and a Day on the Trails

If you don't know about Giraffy's awesome virtual race for Team Gabby, you much go CHECK IT OUT.  If you don't know, Gabby (Giraffy's youngest kiddo) was diagnosed with leukemia a year ago.

I was honored to help support Team Gabby!!!  I decided to run the half marathon since I'm in taper for Rocky Raccoon 50-miler.  I was afraid Coach Adam might kill me if I ran a marathon during taper - although you all know I was tempted.

The plan today was to hit the trails!!!  I was really excited to go to a trail that is right down the street from me that I'm always too afraid to go on alone - fear of getting lost.  The Rowlett Creek Trails are a series of 14 small loops.  After a crazy busy morning, I met a great crew of frunners at around 8:30am (Libby, Alicia, Catherine, Lisa, Kristi, and Mahima).  I am so thankful that there are really great people willing to meet me for this run that I felt I needed before Rocky Raccoon in 2 weeks.

We headed out on several small loops... first loop was 1.65 because we missed a turnoff... oops!  I guess that's better than getting lost 10 miles from the parking lot!  The second loop we finished just past 6 miles.  Loop 3, we got to explore one of the slightly more difficult loops, and I really enjoyed it despite the ginormous hill that we wasted 5 minutes staring over wondering who was gonna go first.  There was some squealing during the decent, and we all felt better when we saw a dude on his bike sitting at the top of the incline with the exact same look on his face as we had a few minutes before.  That loop finished at 9 miles.

By the last loop, it was just me and Libby.  I was fatigued from 8 miles of speedwork on Friday (which was the goal... to have to run this on fatigued legs) and Libby is coming back after surgery and had an intense workout with her trainer yesterday.  There might have been some moaning and whining from both parties in those last miles, but we hit the car at 13.9 miles and called it a day.  3 hrs and 24 minutes on the trails was plenty of time on feet for this girl!!! No falls, no major issues, lots of time on trails... and now the taper gets serious!

Now, it's your turn!!!  Go sign up for Giraffy's Virtual Race and run *your* race!