Approaching the Finish

On Sunday morning I woke up at 5:45 am in order to meet some of the students. The day before one of them had invited me to go running with them, and I agreed. Although I enjoy running, I thought that a 6 am run on Sunday would definately be difficult. Especially since there was a party at our house the night before, though I was asleep the majority of the time (by the way, I am thankful for earplugs). I know that I was asleep most of the time because when I got up to go running, people were still at the house. Anyway, I walked to the school and Roman picked me up and drove to the Cerro (hill) de Bachoco. It was still dark when we got there, though the sun was beginning to rise. There were four of us running: Lupita, Roman, Cristina, and me.
We took off running after a little bit of warm up, and the trail was a dirt trail through some desert-type land. It was pretty cool. And the sun was rising, so that was cool. And I was running with people and being pushed, so that was cool. And sometimes we had an amazing view of the whole city, so that was cool. And it wasn't 100 degrees, so that was cool.
It was an 8 kilometer run which is apparently 4.9712 miles. All of my runs so far have been about 25 minutes. This one, however, took 42:29.35. Much longer than my other runs, and my pace was a little slow, but this one was over difficult terrain and was hilly the entire time. But it was an amazing run. When I finished, my thought was, "wow, that might be in my top five runs ever." I think a lot of that was especially in comparison to my other runs in Hermosillo which have been on half-way decent sidewalks along busy streets.
That made me think about some of my good runs that I have had and what makes a good run. If I had to list my top five runs ever, I think I would choose (and still in no particular order) my three marathons, the second 22 miler that Bland and I did, and the Vatican Run.
I really enjoyed my first marathon because I ran it with Cross Country friends, and though I was slow at three miles, I beat several of them in the marathon. Also, it was the farthest I had ever run, and basically I just thought it was awesome. A couple of side notes, afterwards we jumped into a hot tub at the hotel, and it felt asolutely amazing. Additionally, at Cracker Barrel, I had country ham, and it was awesome.
The second marathon was really good as well, though a lot different. It was much colder, and not with a lot of other Cross Country guys, but I still loved it. Especially since I reduced my time by a lot.
The twenty-two mile training run with Bland was the highest runner's high that I ever had. My legs were sore when I started the run, but we gradually increased our speed throughout the run, and by the time we got to about mile 19, I was feeling incredible. I told Bland so and then really picked up the pace. I think he wanted to cut my legs off at that point, but he stayed with me. I can't explain how it was that I started feeling absolutely incredible. It was just a runner's high. And it was awesome.
The third marathon was with Bland. We had trained a lot, so I was sad that my overall time did not improve much, but my pacing was a lot better. All of my miles were faster than nine minutes. Also, and I am sorry Bland, but after he beat me in all of the other races, I was glad when at about mile 21 or 22 I went by him (RTFOOE). I felt like I finished strong, though not nearly as good a finish as the 22 mile run. It was also fun(ny) to see the K3A guys all wearing pink shirts.
The final of those five runs was the Vatican run, which was basically just very memorable.
I also thought some about what makes a good run, and thought of some aspects, though these are far from absolute. For instance, good weather helps make a run better, but my freshman year at Harding one of my favorites was in a downpour. Anyway, some other aspects would be running with friends, a good course, being pushed, a good time (for instance, sunrise), feeling good during the run (it is hard to enjoy a run if you are sick, sore, or over-hydrated starting at mile eight and have to wait about ten miles). Anyway, I am still debating about what other things make a run better. If anyone has any ideas, let me know.
Finally, similar to approaching a finish line of a race, I am approaching the finish line in Hermosillo. I will be in Monterrey after New Year's, and my final day in Hermosillo is Saturday, December 22nd.