Saturday 5/10

75 and overcast (but nice enough) in Rochester, NH

My parents had a BBQ today, and I ate way too much. It always ends up happening when I come home, so it was to be expected. After lunch and hanging out with my family for a while, I crashed on the couch for a while before heading out for a run. Once recuperated from my food coma, I headed down to Spaulding to run one of the training runs we did in high school. The route I did leaves from the parking lot through the Pines. I ran a half a mile on the trails and crossed the footbridge to the neighborhood across the Cocheco River. From there, I headed over to route 202A towards Strafford. I hit the first set of rolling hills while on 202, and I could definitely feel them. Since the majority of my runs so far this year have been along the Charles River, I really haven’t done many hills at all. There have probably only been two or three runs max that have included a vertical gain of more than 100 feet over the entire run. The first big hill comes right at the 3 mile mark. It’s got a decent grade to it and has about 200 feet of vertical gain to it. For a runner use to flat runs like myself, it was enough to put the burn in my legs. At the top, I turned right to Meaderboro Rd which continues to climb for a half mile or so before dropping back down for the next turn onto Four Rod Rd. The next hill of any consequence only has about 80 ft of vertical gain, but it is almost straight up and can really throw my stride off. Thankfully, it comes after a decent drop and wasn’t much of an issue. After that, the run rolls up and down as it turns onto Ten Rod Rd which begins the decent back towards the high school. The next mile has steady downhill section that evens out for the last 2 miles and loops back into the neighborhood near the river. As I head back into the Pines, I add on a loop along the trails to get the run a bit closer to 10 miles. Overall, the hills slowed me down as expected, but it was a good run and nice change of pace. The total vertical gain was 420 feet which is a lot for me considering it is 10 times more than I usually get in Boston. The good thing is that none of the races on my radar for this summer are terribly hilly, so I’ve got time to work on it. 9.75 miles in 56:46.