My daughter crossing a creek while on our morning run.
I’m 54 years old and this is my first time participating in a “sports camp.” Or, you might call is a group mini runcation. We’re at Mammoth Lakes for some altitude running with r running club.
This morning I ran a nice 7 miles on a dirt road. There were some rolling hills, but overall it was pretty level. Just ove 2 miles in the road was rocky, curvy, and downhill. After falling about 3 weeks ago I was being very careful to avoid tripping. As soon as I passed this area, the ground was level and not very rocky. So I relaxed and then tripped on a small rock, fell forward and hit the front of my ankle on a tree root. Ouch!
After picking myself the front of my ankle hurt. I walked a bit…no pain with putting weight on it( but there was pain in lifting it 😬. I kept going…very slowly.
The run was beautiful and enjoyable. Even though I was running slow…and walking every time my heart rate hit 140, I was pretty tired as I approached the 7 mile mark. In fact, I looked at my watch, it said 6.96, I thought “good, I’m done,” and fell again! I wasn’t the only one to fall, I think five of us fell on the run…I win the clutzy prize for falling twice.
The lesson? I don’t pick my right foot up completely. I even wear the sole in the toe of my right foot because of this. Maybe if I run more trails I’ll develop better habits…or fall a lot!
After the run we hiked to the crater…I didn’t know there was a crater! Cool!
When we got back to the condo I iced my sore foot and took some ibuprofen and hoped I’d be good for our afternoon hike. It worked and off we went to Convict Lake.
The trail is under water…cool
We hiked around the lake, about three miles, including wading through a big stream of very cold snow runoff. At the end we stopped to enjoy the lake for awhile. Most of us soaked our feet in the very cold lake water. A few of us went out on paddle boards that some club wonderful members. I took a turn but stayed on my knees because I didn’t want to fall into the very cold water.
We ended the day with dinner at a local Italian restaurant. Good food and great company.
Tomorrow’s run and hike are supposed to be a bit harder so hopefully my foot feels ok. And hopefully I pick up my feet tomorrow!
Gratitude: I’m thankful for this beautiful world that God created; for the opportunity to challenge myself out in this big beautiful world; and for the running tribe that my family and I are part of.
Some photos from our time at Convict Lake
