The Joys of Spring Running

Spring really is such a magical time if you take care to notice all of the small changes as life seems to begin fresh after winter's slumber.  My feed has been full of stunning photos of flower buds and vibrant green trees coming to life.  I went for a 10.5-mile run Wednesday morning and kind of kicked myself for not bringing my phone with me.  Inspired by one of @chelsea88's latest running posts at a park near her, I finally had the chance to make it back over to the Chattahoochee Nature Preserve for part of my run.  It was so beautiful to see everything down by the river, especially since the time of day I went was pretty quiet as far as foot traffic.  Though I can't share any of those specific scenes with you, Mother Nature gave me a great consolation prize this morning when I looked out of the window after doing yoga.

Nope, not talking about the decrepit grill that @dksart is figuring out what to do with.  Look a little further.  Into the neighbor's yard...

The deer are back! Sorry the photos are not the best--I was trying not to scare them away!  We haven't seen them in quite some time, but there is a family of deer that lives in the woods behind our house.  People have been back in the woods clearing out the brush the last few months (not sure what they are doing yet), so I was afraid they might have scared them off.  Apparently not because as far as I could tell I counted 7 of the lovely creatures.  They were eating the bushes in the neighbor's yard and the little ones were dashing around playing.  I just stood on the porch enthralled for at least 15 minutes watching them.

It really is so easy to get caught up in the day-to-day grind of living, and just the same holds true for running.  I know I sometimes get out and just duck my head to get in the miles.  Having a little reminder from time to time to just stop and take in a small piece of joy in your day is a wonderful thing.  Wherever you are today, try to take a moment out in nature to just be.  You may just find that bit of joy sticks with you throughout the day.

Though some of my run was on the streets to get to the trail, I still tried to stay in the moment and just enjoy the time on my feet.  I opted not to use my heart rate monitor again so I could just go by feel and not worry too much about metrics.  I am planning on this being my last double digit run before my race in 2 weeks.  Since I wasn't throwing in any speed work this time around, I wanted to keep a fairly easy pace the whole way.

I can tell the benefit of having done one half already this season (meaning my build up to this next race was longer), as my longer runs are feeling much more enjoyable than a few months ago.  Don't get me wrong, I was still whipped later in the day.  The run itself just felt good.  The pace was pretty steady throughout.  I hit a few hills in the last few miles, so it slowed appropriately to keep my effort the same.  My legs and hips feel solid, and mentally I was in a happy place with all of the lovely scenery around me.

I did a nice upper body workout yesterday to let my legs recover, then hit the yoga mat this morning to work on my mobility.  I'll probably get in a shorter run tomorrow and throw in a few downhill portions to keep my legs ready for race day.  I'm close enough now that I'm continuing to visualize success when the big day comes!  I've put in the work, so we shall see what I'm made of. ;)

Happy running!