bike ride in the storm and upcoming half marathon

We’ve got a busy weekend coming up.  Our friend Jackie has a birthday and we’ll head up to the Tulalip Casino for some Bingo then to Alligator Soul for some dinner.  Susan and I decided to go for a bike ride, hoping to offset some of those impending calories.

The sky was black when we arrived on Harbor Ave.  We should have known not to ride but we headed out anyway.  It was a littly rainy and a little breezy but not too bad.  The lights from downtown Seattle were pretty clear as the wind had moved any low clouds off the water.  As soon as we rounded the point that’s when it hit.  The wind practically blew me backwards.  Well, that’s what it felt like anyway.  There were a few times when I was blown sideways too.  The nice part was that there were very few people out on the trail.

We headed toward Alki.  I looked out across the Sound toward Bainbridge Island.  The lights there were crystal clear too.  Ferries coming and going were all lit up.  There were logs in the water but the waves were pretty subdued here.  Actually, the water seemed to swell and heave gently with the current.  Seemed pretty inviting except it looked cold and dark.

We regrouped and decided to keep going.  That is, until we rounded the corner onto Beach Drive.  Not only was the wind whipping at us, it was throwing the rain into our faces and the waves crashing into the seawall were spraying us.  We went a block and decided to turn around.  With the wind at our backs, the ride was pretty nice.  Though that didn’t last long.  We rounded the corner and were blasted again on the Elliott Bay side.

We pushed on and eventually made it back to the truck and in the process nearly had to run over a f*cktard in all black running on the trail going from side to side.  Still, I’ll feel pretty good about the seafood gumbo I’ll be enjoying tomorrow evening.  And if the bike ride wasn’t enough to zero out the calories, Sundays Mud and Chocolate half marathon should.

This will be our second Half Marathon but our first trail run.  We are looking forward to it even though the weather is supposed to be miserable.  Guess that’s where the Mud will come in.  Apparently it’ll be three loops at 4.4 miles each.  Susan has offered to be our “crew”.  Of course, there’s a price for her services:  we have to pay her in chocolate.  Shouldn’t be difficult since they’ll be offering it at every aid station.

This will also be my first race with my hydration backpack.  I’ve worn it 2-3 times while running and it’s worked out pretty well except the plastic taste and that it wears on my tech shirts something fierce.