Start time: 6/11/11, 6:35am
Location: Waterfront, Hains Point
Distance: 10 miles
Average pace: 10:01min/mile
Total Miles For June: 33 miles
Total Miles For 2011: 340 miles

Saturday’s run was an odd one. Originally I thought I was going to miss it, but due to a change of plans it looked like it would fit.

The plan was that Ben would run to the school in Southwest where we’d meet Stephanie, Rich, and Bill at 7am for an 8-miler (and that way Ben would get in 10). Sounded like a good plan, so I got there early, ran two miles, and met up with everyone else.

The route was pretty simple — take the bridge to Hains Point, then go up Ohio Drive all the way to Independence, and take it and Jefferson back to 4th St and go back down to the school.

About two miles in, Bill was gasping and wheezing to the point that I thought he was going to keel over. Apparently while he hasn’t been running since his last run with us, he did “an intense leg workout” at the gym on Friday night. He started talking about heading back early, and by mile 3 he’d dropped make to take some more walk breaks and was a little dot behind us. It was already grossly hot though, so before we left Hains Point, Stephanie and Ben came up with a new plan. We’d skip Ohio and Independence and just head directly back to the cars, which would be around 6 miles. Stephanie was going to stop there, but Rich and Ben and I would run up to the horse’s butt and drop Ben off (who would run the rest of the way home — turns out it’s 2.5 miles each way so that’d actually add up to 11 miles) and Rich and I would head back. Bill was nowhere in sight by this point.

So, we went back to the cars, the three of us headed up to the horse, we waved goodbye to Ben, started running back (through a sea of children, yay) and on the other side of the Reflecting Pool… Jim and Michael showed up. They were off on their own run and looked a little boggled to see me and Rich with no one else in sight. We said hey, each headed our own way… and standing at 4th and Jefferson, looking incredibly lost, was Bill. He said he’d cut directly over and was trying to find us to head back. (On the bright side the rest had done him some good and he no longer sounded like he was going to die.)

Finally made it back to the cars, gulped down my drink that Stephanie had thoughtfully bought for me, and then went home and showered and changed so Charlie and I could go to an outdoor wedding. Phew.

(8:46, 8:50, 10:10, 10:06, 10:11, 10:30, 10:27, 10:22, 10:16, 10:22)