Lost my lunch on Lost Lake Trail

Here's a tip: Don't run up mountains when you're sick with a fever.

Not that I would ever heed such advice.

Yesterday was slated as the last possible sunny day before snow and even though I was sick, I couldn't stand the idea of not being out on the trails.

 I tied on my muddy shoes, called for the dog and headed for Lost Lake.

Of course I didn't run up the more gently-sloped summer trail. No, I struggled up the winter trail, which is half the distance but twice the steepness.

In my feverish mind, this made perfect sense. Why wouldn't someone who was sick and had no business being on the trails in the first place choose the most difficult route?

My chest ached. My head swirled in the most delicious of ways.

At about the half mile mark, I met Cedar coming down.

Cedar at the start of the 2010 Mt. Marathon Race. She's on the far right with the print tank. Photo credit: Roy Corral.

Cedar Bourgeois is kind of a mountain running legend down here in Seward. She's won the Mt. Marathon Race seven times. 

She breezed down in a pair of shorts and longsleeve tech top and I struggled up in a pair of capris and a windbreaker tied around my waist and I kind of felt like the girl in elementary school that never gets picked for dodgeball.
 
We stopped and chatted for a minute. I stupidly suggested that we run together sometime. Imagine me trying to keep up, eh?

Like I said, I was feverish.

A few minutes later I felt it in my throat. The Progresso no MSG, low salt veggie soup I had eaten for lunch was determined to come back up, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

I lost my lunch on the Lost Lake Trail. In my dazed state, seemed right and true, almost poetic.

The moral of this story is that when I reached the cabin, where the relentless uphill finally tapers off, I glanced at my watch and discovered that I had shaved five minutes off last week's time.

Huh?

It seems the secret of a faster time isn't rest or carbs, it's being struck silly by fever.

By the time I drove home I could barely make it up the steps.

I settled on the couch with "The Good Wive" TV series DVD. The show is fairly good (love Chris Noth) but the women wear way too much makeup and their hair is way too styled. I wanna see them messed and frazzled. I want them to kick off their ridiculous shoes and sweat through a trail race.

Running: 7.1 miles
Reading: "The Mystery of Breathing" by Perri Klass