"Honey, I'm taking the day off of work tomorrow to go run."
"Great. You are crazy. Are you running around town?"
"Nope, I'm going to THAT PLACE with John."
"Although you are crazy, try not to pull John in on being crazy with you."
"Okay" - however, for the record, I think it was John's idea.
John and I headed back out to eastern Iowa to run on a piece of land where rolling hills are plenty and the smell of cows is abound. This is about the best training for me in the area, the hills are long and steep, but provide a spectacular view when reaching the top. For me, the training run itself is probably one of the best workouts that I can do; going slow, with long tough hills on nice soft grass.
Being from Nebraska, the rural setting is one where I feel at home. The cows provided a calming effect, they all just watched us in silence, their heads slowly turning keeping an eye on us as we ran by them. Sometimes, I wish these were the spectators at races, where they don't say much, but encourage you to keep going (instead of that guy who has never run more than 5 miles, who at mile 20, tells you that you look good).
John and I hit about 16 miles over 3 hours. Yes, only 16 miles in 3 hours. The hills were tough, but it was one of the best runs I've ever had.
Picture from one of the top of the hills...
One of the long steep hills, John is only about a 1/4 of the way up on this....
Oh the cows...John and I talked about how much a head of cattle was worth? We had no idea....
Our start and finish line...The weather was near perfect on this day!
Just discovered your blog (tracking down who visits mine). People always think Iowa's flat, but there's some beautiful hills on the eastern side.
ReplyDeleteI'd guess a cow's worth about $3000. But that's just a guess.