Sunday morning I set my alarm clock early and headed back to the Carolina Beach State Park. Ran my hill circuit 3 times, decreasing the elapsed loop time successively from 8:00, to 7:45, to 7:40. Counting off the hills not only mentally, but physically as well on my hand.
Telling myself as each step up the sandy crests got tougher, "push through it push through it push through it push through it." Reminding myself to take it one hill at a time. Finding brief comfort zones between, where the searing in the legs would abate and breathing became tolerable. Doing the math. 5 of 12 hills completed is about 41%. Runners love Math. Equations. Calculations. God is in the details. So is the devil.
When I was done with the hills I had that wave of exhaustion wash over me like an anaesthetic drip we runners are familiar with after intensely concentrated outputs in effort. I reveled in the chance to run slowly back Sugar Loaf Trail to the visitor's center parking lot. My own personal victory lap. For today I didn't back down. I pushed through. I won.
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