Uphill all the way

This looks like the hills I ran (walked) today

Living in North Carolina means that you live surrounded by hills.  I'll take hills and trees over the flat prairie any day, but running those hills is really challenging.  When I first started running I always walked up the hills.  Mentally, I just couldn't do it. I would see a hill, and think, stop!  When I trained with a 10k group this spring our trainer made us do hill repeats.  We ran up and down this giant hill on the greenway 4 times in a row.  Something switched in my brain from STOP to PUSH HARDER.  I live at the bottom of a hill.  So every time I run, my first 1/2 mile is all uphill.  I can now run all the way up this hill, but not very fast.

Today I started out on my usual route, thinking that I would run about 3 miles.  My first 1/2 mile up the hill I felt strong.  The sun was shining, there was a slight wind blowing, and I thought, hey, this seems easy today!  Next mile was downhill, and I'm going fast (for me).  I thought, hey, I'm going to run up that big hill on Devonshire Rd and hook back into Stumptown Road.  This is a big hill that I HATE and rarely run.  It was on the route of my 10k race back in the spring.  It's about 1 mile long steadily uphill. I ran out of steam fast. About halfway up that darn hill got me.  I had to walk part (most) of it.  So much for my fast run.

As I was walking another runner passed me.  I smiled and waved, as I always do.  This runner lady had a water belt on, and was not even looking like she was tired.  I wondered how far she was going today.  I realized I should have worn my water belt, because unless I turned back towards home, I was going to run closer to 5 miles.

I hit Stumptown and decided to keep going.  Past the elementary school is all downhill.  But then I hit the steepest hill in my neighborhood, Hugh Macaulay Road.  Walked about half of that hill too.  But then the last mile was all downhill.  I ended up running 5.18 miles in 57 minutes.  Even with the walking I did 5 miles in under an hour.  For me, that was pretty good.    I am running 8 miles for my long run this weekend.  And I just realized that one month from today I will be running the Huntersville Half Marathon!