I did my first group training run today. It was a short run; 1 mile warm up, 1.8 mile race, 1 mile cool down. I did the race in 14’20, which is an 8-minute mile pace. I’m pretty happy with that — ya gotta start somewhere. There were 3 people in the group today and I came in 2nd.
On the really cool side I’d gotten about a quarter mile into the race when the heaven’s opened and it started pouring rain.
Not little drops; more like the Forest Service was dumping helicopters full of water on Central Park to put out a fire.
You could see people running for cover everywhere except for some runners. They just started smiling and kept running. And it was infectious. I couldn’t stop grinning for the entire race. I’m still smiling now.
The rain didn’t stop the race, it just cooled me down and helped me run faster. Now if I can just apply that philosophy to the other times when life rains all over me…
– Art Clarke
Help me raise $5,000 to help care for people with cancer!
A. B. Clarke 
Definitely impressive. I doubt I could run one mile in 8 minutes, let alone 3.8 miles.
Nice observation regarding seeing the positive side when it rains. =)
Actually I’m sure I couldn’t run 3.8 miles in 8 minutes 🙂 I only did 1.8 in 8 minutes. The other 2 were warms up (about 11 min miles)
Art, remember when we had that unspoken, ongoing competition running the Stevens Creek trail at Shoreline? Well, if you need a running partner give me a call any time. I need to get back into it as well.
Art, I used to run through central park in the rain and it was great! But, try running through central park in the 6 mile chase manhatten run they used to have every year. It’s elbow to asshole the whole way. Much less enjoyable!