~15 miles @ ~10.5 min/mi

At dawn as I run down Warren St toward the Capital Crescent Trail a bunny scampers off the sidewalk in front of me. Half a block later another does likewise. Could this street be named not for a person, but for a long-ago nest of critters? One more rabbit flees my approach five miles later, along River Rd. There are also countless cardinals and robins and squirrels, one chipmunk, and a fearless-foolish young deer that poses for me at mile 14+ on the climb up Ireland Dr from Rock Creek on the final homeward stretch.

This morning Good Intentions to start at 0500 collide with Reality, and it's 5:30am when I finally get GPS lock and set off from the front steps. The route is one that I've done before, solo and with friends, forward and reverse: CCT to River Rd to Western Av to Military Rd, then home via Beach Dr and Rock Creek Trail. (see 2004-07-17 - Rock Creek and Capital Crescent Mini-loop, 2004-11-13 - Wonderful Windy Weather, 2005-12-26 - Winter Wardrobe, 2008-12-13 - Rock Creek West Loop, 2011-04-30 - Rock Creek-CCT Loop West, and in modified fashion as part of 2012-10-07 - Stephanie's Loop and Rebecca's Blitz) Pauses intervene at the foggy Columbia Country Club and at the pulchritudinous Mermaid Fountain where I stop to take pictures (though the ones in 2012-06-06 - National Park Seminary Statues are better).

Initial pace plan is 11-12 min/mi and even though it's rather humid I manage to improve on that via a succession of sub-10 miles in the middle. Blood stains from abraded nipples do a chromatography experiment on my white shirt, but pain is minimal until during the post-run shower when sweat washes down. Few other runners are out until I reach Rock Creek Park, where I meet multiple MCRRC training groups that include folks who greet me by name; Bob Yarchoan and Anny Rosenthal are among the few whom I know, alas. At Candy Cane City shortly after 7:30am Barry Smith, Emaad Burki, and Alyssa Smith (whose name I am embarrassed to ask) are awaiting others to materialize for their trek. Barry begins to tell the Woodchipper Story from last week's Bighorn ultramarathon but I apologize and ask him to recount it for me later, since I have to rush home to go to the Silver Spring farmers market and the Bank on behalf of DD & DW. Under Rock Creek Trestle I almost bump into long-time friend Norm, and promise him a better explanation of Bayes Theorem at a later date.

Runkeeper glitches at the Wisconsin Av tunnel and awards me a bonus ~0.2 mile compared to the Garmin. Its splits are 10:36 + 10:17 + 11:55 (photo op at Columbia Country Club) + 11:08 + 9:53 + 9:34 + 9:54 + 10:17 + 9:02 + 11:23 (water bottle refill) + 10:04 + 9:54 + 10:19 (greet friends at Candy Cane City) + 9:05 + 13:38 (multiple photos) and a final fraction at 12:02 min/mi pace. The scale reads 144.2 lbs before, 141.1 immediately after, and 142.2 a couple of hours later post-recovery meal.

^z - 2013-07-12