Sunday Run

When after the Winter alarmin’,
The Spring steps in so charmin’,
So fresh and arch
In the middle of March,
Wid her hand St. Patrick’s arm on…
~Alfred Percival Graves

This week’s run highlighted the fact that we’re on the cusp of spring, but winter is not all but forgotten. Brueggers was full of energy as some prepared for the long run and others met up for the trip to New Bedford for a day of racing a half marathon. About 18 started the run up Main St as Pam and I rushed out to the water stop to jump in at mile three. Although the air was crisp and cool most were removing gloves and jackets at the water stop 3 miles into the run at the corner of Main and Nahant in Wakefield. Mike York was justifying his wardrobe decision of shorts, which seemed pretty optimistic as the temperatures creeped up from the mid 30s towards 40. From the water stop we joined the crew along with Sue Clough for a loop around Lake Quannapowitt. Molly, Mary and Ed Morris followed Church St at the lake to loop back for the 8 mile route, back to the water stop and home along Main, while others followed Main St along the lak. As our group towards the back reached Rte 109 we spotted the group ahead of us chasing Ed’s blue running jacket through the Comverse office park. The east side of the pond felt cool, the wind blowing across the cold lake, while the west side along North Ave heated us up as Sue Clough and I reminisced about our 8th grade lives.

After regrouping at the water stop and stripping down to shorts, my pack headed off down Nahant towards Breakheart, while Mike headed back Main St to finish his 10 mile run. Nancy’s awkward gate was obvious from the start and caused concern as we pulled ahead making our way to Farm St. Sue and I tackled the hills of Breakheart together, my encouraging insistance that she run all the hills proved halfway useful as she charged up every other hill. Once at the headquarter on the Saugus side of the reservation we watched for Pam and Lois coming in, then waited for Nancy… until Matt came in and told us she was forced to turn back to the water stop due to injury. Off we went along the flatter side of Breakheart which was surprisingly at least 10 degrees colder than the other side, as ice and snow still bordered the path and blanketed the hills. Brrr! We scurried through to the Voc where Sue tried to wait for Nancy again, although we knew she wouldn’t be showing up. Insisting I go ahead (and stop bothering her) I crossed Nahant back to the water stop to finish my run and check in on Nancy. Behind me came Sue, Pam, Lois, and Matt. Of the 5 there, 4 of us were done for the day. In a great display of fortitude Lois didn’t take the easy out of heading back with us in the car, and instead followed in the footsteps of the runners ahead, back to Brueggers to finish the 16 mile route.

Back at Brueggers I got reports back from some very salty looking runner: Nick’s still hurting yet running strong at the same time, Ginny looked healthy and happy having eaten breakfast before her run this week, our visitors for the day were very pleased with their run, Joe and Ed are hitting their strides and the sky’s the limit, and Carol was not hurting as witnesses suspected but was running 22 miles for the day so weaved her way back to Brueggers tacking on extra miles. While we sipped on our coffees and avoided the green St Patrick’s bagels, a nice morning came to an end with hopes that winter too had come to an end… wishful thinking for us New Englanders.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 15th, 2009 at 6:00 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.