First Outside Run of 2014

On February 27 I decided to take my first outside run of 2014.  I stopped for a quick second to snap this picture! 

WAIT!!  Didn't I recently post THIS picture from out our back door?

Oh yeah that's because I wasn't at home!  I was lucky enough to go to CALIFORNIA to visit two of my siblings.  And while I was there the weather held out for about a day and then some nasty rain storms came through.  But before that happened I went out for a run.  I hadn't really run all winter.  I was too busy with my T25 workouts to run on our new treadmill and going outside (as obvious from the picture above) wasn't going to happen for me.  So I was a little nervous going out.  I set a goal for a 5k (3.1 miles) and took my phone with a map on it since I had NO CLUE where I was.  I thought I'd just do a quick out and back because those seem to be the best for me.  So I set out on my solo adventure in Cali. I went out of my brother's subdivision and took a left, I quickly got to the end of that street and decided to take another left.  I figured if I just took a couple lefts I would just take a couple rights to get home.  Silly me did NOT look at the streets I was turning on!  My new Garmin (first time I have used it since I received it at Christmas) soon chimed out that I had gone a mile, 11:03 pace.  I was pretty darn happy with that considering my average pace last year was somewhere around 10:30 so I didn't feel like I had lost a lot of time.  Pretty soon I looked and I was at my half was point, so I turned around and started heading for home.  Pretty soon my watch chimed out mile 2 with a 10:41 pace.  HOLY COW!  I couldn't believe it!  I felt like I was gliding on air but I guess I really was just settling into my old stride.  Here is where it gets a little shady.  As I mentioned before I had never even SEEN California before let alone this neighborhood and I had NO idea where to turn to get back to the street I DID know.  So I had to take a quick break to check my maps (thank you Apple!) and get directions on where to turn so that I knew where I was again.  Thankfully I hadn't passed the street and was able to turn right pretty easily!  So I turned right onto the correct street and soon after my watch chimed mile 3, 10:42 pace.  WHOA!  I ALMOST had negative splits the whole time!  So with the last .10 to go I turned on my "push to the finish" sprint and got it done!  Final time? 33:27!  Average pace? 10:47!  I am over the moon that this run happened (gotta love vacation running) and that it was as good as it was!  I have no doubt that T25 helped me keep my strength and cardio up over the winter.  Now if Spring can finally spring (is that redundant?!) here, I will be happy to get outside and get going on my outside run training!

Have you had your first outside run of the year? How did it go?  What is the weather like where you are?

Love, Lacey