Fit Fun Mom

The “long” in “long weekend” refers not to the Labor Day three-day weekend, but the long run and long ride I did on Saturday and Sunday.

The full moon smiled on my morning run

Early Saturday morning I busted out a new personal distance record with 14 miles, most of which I ran at the track because my delicate feet needed a softer, flatter surface than the roads near my house. The run felt great with a pace of 9:40 and a total time of 2:15:27. That’s 6.2 miles per hour for 14 whopping miles, and I can still remember a year and a half ago when I couldn’t run a mile on the treadmill at 6 miles per hour!

After a cold water bath (I no longer torture myself with ice but do dip in a cold tub for 10 minutes), a glass of chocolate milk to drink, and a quick hot shower, I hopped in the car with my family. Friends invited us and another family to spend the weekend with them in Poway. Poway is a pretty town in San Diego County that calls itself “The City in the Country.” I can tell you it makes for an amazing setting for a long bike ride. My husband Mike and I roped our friend Seth into a 23-mile ride along the SR-56 bike trail.

Mike, Seth and me. Gee, that doesn’t look like a cell phone camera self-portrait at all!

As you can probably guess from that creative trail name, the SR-56 bike trail follows State Route 56, but it’s prettier than its name implies. If you’re willing to do a little riding on the road at the end, you can make your way from Poway all the way down to Torrey Pines State Beach.

Rewarded with the view of Torrey Pines State Beach from the end of the trail

I went to University of California, San Diego, so this is my old stomping grounds. Mike must have thought of that when he chose to wear my UCSD long-sleeve technical tee for the ride:

Yes, my long-haired husband also has no problem wearing my woman’s technical tee. I love you honey!

We were all enthralled with the view and happy until we realized the 11.5-mile ride back would be uphill! (That’s the thing in California. You quickly learn that any trail headed toward the ocean runs downhill and, you guessed it, anything headed away from the ocean runs uphill. See: water, river, flow, ocean, your physics lesson for the day). I looked at it as great preparation for the rolling hills I will ride on PCH for the Nautica Malibu international tri in a couple of weeks. I also enjoyed it more than I should have, because I am faster than the boys on the hills (granted, they are faster than I am on the downhills and turns because me = chicken). While I waited for the boys to finish, I tacked on an extra two miles, just to say that I did 25 miles total, a little more than I’ll need to ride in the triathlon.

I owe a big thanks to my friend Bonnie for watching the kids while Mike, Seth and I rode. It’s a double treat to ride with them and in such a beautiful setting. (The third treat was the post-bike recovery fuel of a half-slice of decadent chocolate cheesecake!)

Did you do any training over the long Labor Day weekend?