Rain, Rain, Go Away

Today I was going to do my ride, no matter what, rain or shine.

B: 4:20 hours at RPE 3.
R: 30 minute recovery run at RPE 2

I didn't get much sleep last night. Elle came into my bed at 4am and threw up all over so I had to change the sheets at 4 in the morning. I was going to wake up at 6, but after that I turned my alarm off. I did get up at 7, though, and set out on my ride by 8. It was raining outside, but I had my rain jacket thought I'd be fine.

After 20 minutes my feet were totally soaked. I got onto the Legacy Parkway trail. I'd seen it before, but didn't know how to get onto it. Pete rode on it yesterday so he told me how to get onto it. I decided I didn't want to have to deal with the rain and traffic so this was nice. Pete told me it would be ok for the way up in the morning, but that it might get crowded with strollers and walkers on the way back. I told him I wouldn't have to worry about this if it was raining. This was last night before we knew it would be raining. Anyway, I started counting the people I saw on the trail since I didn't think there would be very many. I counted 3 tough runners and 5 die-hard cyclists, The majority of them were women, and I even got a "Wahoo" from one of them. Then I saw a guy just standing there and wondered what in the world he was doing standing in the middle of nowhere in the rain. But when I passed him he told me to be careful, there were racers coming. I gave up counting then because I thought there would be too many, but I think there were about 5 more runners out there racing in the rain. This gave me strength and reminded me of my marathon. I totally knew how these people felt.

Of course, I was getting pretty cold and wet myself by now. Thanks to my jacket, my upper body and and my head were nice and dry (not counting my hands and my face), but my legs and feet were totally soaked and numb. I kept hoping the rain would let up, but it only got worse. I guess I was about as wet as I could get anyway, so it wouldn't have helped even if it had stopped. When I got to the end of the trail, it was a little past the one hour mark, and I decided to just head home.

I got home after about 2 and a half hours. I wasn't paying much attention, I just wanted to get home and get dry. I did a total of 31 miles at about 14 miles an hour. I think. I wrote it down, but threw away the paper.

As soon as I got inside, and had Ethan pull my gloves off because my hands weren't working too well, I got in the tub. The water felt so warm on my feet and hands, but then my feet started itching like crazy! Pete came in to bring me some hot chocolate and he said, "Did you crash?!" because my ankles were so purple and red, they looked bruised. They looked really bad, he was kind of worried. But a few minutes more in the water, and the color went back to normal. Then I realized that my water was actually pretty cold so I had to add some more hot. Pete asked my why I didn't just ride on the trainer. I just thought 4 and a half hours on the trainer would be so awful, but at least I would have gotten my time in. I skipped the run too. I just though, "Forget 4 and a half hours, and forget running!" I was sick of being cold and wet, and my feet were too numb to run anyway.

I don't like to complain about the rain because we always need it around here, but I'm thinking, since it rained the last 2 Saturdays, next Saturday's got to be nice, right? I just looked up the weather for St. George next week and it's supposed to be sunny with a high of 94! That's a little extreme, but at least it's not supposed to rain! Hot sand, here we come!

This evening the rain let up a little so we were still able to get our pictures taken. I was so glad, I thought for sure we'd have to cancel. It was a lot of fun, and I'm excited to see how they turn out! Here's a little preview.