10K (6.2M) run in Alpharetta. Lovely spring morning. Finished run, stretched and then went inside Starbucks to pick up a drink. And ran into good old Ananda Rakhit. Had not seen him in quite some time. Was a good catch up meeting. Then had to run for all the weekend chauffeuring duties….

Morning run in midtown Atlanta. At one point, I stopped at a traffic light and looked up and poof! The top of the building had vanished in thin air!!! 🙂

5K in Milton hills. Starbucks coffee. In other words, so far an uneventful morning 🙂

Two surviving members of the Chalupa clan today. Trail run in rain and cold. The near desolate trail was incredibly beautiful in the rain. The overnight rain had the creeks gushing with water. The big trees were dripping constantly.
As we finished up our run, a lady who was just starting her run, summed it up best as we passed each other – “What a beautiful morning”!
Amen!!!

Raining constantly. Only one other person in the trail. Not a single Chalupa has shown up yet….

The herd thinned out a little due to the Daylight Savings (everybody slept an hour less). We were excited to have two first timers there – Nachiketa and his younger daughter Remi!!

Like last week, tried keeping up with Pooja for the first mile. Initially she ran at 7:30 min/mile pace. And then for the last quarter mile she decided that we should sprint – we peaked at 6:15 min/mile!!! I raced to win and then when I realized that I won’t, I raced to make her break the record 😉

After that was a leisurely couple of miles more!!!

… by my standards. At Chalupa run today, decided to give company to Pooja. I don’t think I had thought this one thru. 15 year old Pooja paced me the first mile at 7 min 20 sec!! Then she took pity on me and slowed down to 8ish. Finally finished up 5K run in 24 min 25 secs!!!
Can you find me in the Chalupa picture?

One of the longer runs in barefoot shoes – 13K (8.1M). Took 1 hour and 19 minutes. Tomorrow I have to switch to the support shoes – I think the muscles are going to be very stiff by tonite.

Remember the skeleton like silhouette against the bluish pink eastern sky I talked about yesterday? Captured one of them during today’s run.

I thought I was the only one in bright neon clothes this morning. Ran into a running group with equally bright colors. It is difficult to recognize people what with all the head gear and all but I think the lady who said Hi to me was Lia. If so, I need to ask her whether I caught her on her 20th mile or 40th mile 🙂

There is only one way to do full justice when you describe the sheer exhilarating feeling after running a few miles in sharp biting cold weather (mid twenties) with sharper winds slashing in your face amid the alluring natural beauty of pristine hills with dry barren trees giving a skeleton-like silhouette against a blue-pink eastern sky.
And that is – “God! I am so freaking glad I got it over with!” 🙂