What a doof

The Frederick Marathon organizes two training runs to allow folks to meet other runners and have a chance to run part of the course. This weekend was the second scheduled training run. I missed the first due to other commitments, so I was excited to run in this one. They had two loops planned, a 10-mile and a 20-mile option. Since I ran 20 miles last weekend, my plan called for a 14-miler this weekend. So my plan was to run the 10-mile loop and then continue on for an additional 4 miles.

The advertisement for the training run said water and Gatorade would be available throughout the course, but I had to bring my own GU. So, as I got ready, I packed my GU, and hydration pack. I was not planning to run with the hydration pack, but brought it just in case. The weather was calling for pretty cold temperatures, 28F at 7am maybe warming to 35F by 9am, so I wore long pants, long sleeves, my hat and gloves. I also brought along a print off of the turn-by-turn directions for the 10-mile loop.

I got to the parking deck about 6:50am and gathered my stuff. The directions said to meet outside the parking deck near Carroll Creek. So as I headed to the creek, I noticed the town was very quiet and peaceful. The sun was just starting to rise, and the breeze was rather cool. When I got to the creek I looked for the people. I could see no people, anywhere. As I wondered why no one was around, I remembered the direction said outside the West Patrick parking deck... and I had parked at the Court St deck. So I ran down Patrick a bit to the deck. As I made my way back to the creek, I noticed it was just about 7am.

But when I got to the creek again there were no people.... it was kinda eerie, , absolutely no people. I began to wonder if I missed everyone. I had RSVPed for the training run, and responded to a post on Frederick Steeplechasers site, but the funny thing was I was the only person to respond... maybe no one else was running this training run???

So, I went back to the car, got the hydration pack, and started out on the course myself. Since the advertisement said there would be aid stations, I would stop at the first one and ask if I was the only one to respond.

The first mile took me down Market street to 5th, then onto Bentz. This was the same route I took during my first 20-mile run several weeks ago. Heading down Bentz took me to Baker park, where I knew I would see the other runners. As I circled Baker park, again it was totally dead... not a single runner, but the day was beautiful. After circling around Frederick High, I came back toward Baker park down 2nd. After about 4.5 miles I knew I had to be wrong about the day.

I stopped and stretched the IT band after mile 6 somewhere near Hood college. Mile 7 and 8 took me through a new subdivision and right by Thomas Johnson high school. I took my GU at 8miles and passed Emma's pre-school at mile 9. By mile 10 I was back at the parking deck down town.

At this point, I knew I had to be wrong, or someone had forgotten to tell me the training run was cancelled. I looped Baker Park one more time for the last four miles and finished in about 1 hour and 50 min. My left knee kinda started bothering me at 13.5 miles, but I stopped and stretched and it seemed ok after that. I realized I had not stretched it since mile 6... If I don't stretch, I can't make it...

When I got back to the car, I used my phone to go back to the website. The training run is scheduled for March 28... I knew I was right....I just kn.... wait..... today is March 27th.... damn, I am such a doof