Nina and I had planned on doing 12 miles today. I don’t know how we came up with 12, except that it was 1 more than the last run we did together. (Which was before Thanksgiving. And our last run wasn’t 11 miles, it was 10. But I digress.) We filled up our Camelbaks and set off at 8:30 this morning.

It was still cold at 8:30. I wore my running gloves, which are gloves with mesh panels to allow sweat to wick away. I noticed I could feel my arms working as they pumped back and forth — I guess even the weight of these lightweight gloves really made a difference. Or I’ve been working the Gravitron too hard.

Normally we’ve been adding .5 mile to the mile markers on the trail, because we start from my house, so if we get to the 1 mile mark, we figure we’ve done 1.5 miles. So we aimed for the 5.5 mile mark. Then I said, “I’m not exactly sure it lines up exactly — I think we’ll be doing between 11 and 12.” So Nina said, “Let’s go to the 6 mark.” At least that way we’d be certain of doing 12!

When we got to the 6 mile mark — which turns out to be Campbell Park! — there was a kiosk with a map of the creek trail on it.

“Where do we start from?” Nina asked. I pointed to the spot on the map.

She added up the numbers from our start to where we were standing now. “It’s 6 miles from the very start of the trail to here.”

“It is?”

“How far is it from your house to the start of the trail?”

“About half a mile.”

“We really are doing 13 miles.”

Huh. You don’t say.

If the mental barrier of doing 12 was hard, doing 13 was even harder, because of the idea that it’s half a marathon. I said during the last mile, “This is officially the longest distance I’ve ever done.” Somehow Nina managed to run up the final hill toward my house with something approaching normal speed. I don’t know how she does that.

We did 13 miles in 2:30 (or thereabouts), meaning currently I’d do about a 5 hour marathon. Clearly I have a lot of work to do to get that time down before I actually do a marathon!

This afternoon I thought I should take a nap and Darin let me stay home to nap while he took the kids to the park. I don’t know whether I wasn’t tired enough or was just too tired, but I didn’t fall asleep. I just lay there a long time.

I can definitely feel the run in my, uh, gluteus maximus. Or as Nina said, “We’re going to have great butts.” I also have a sore spot where the heart rate monitor was rubbing my skin (ouch). Other than that and the blister on my toe, I’m relatively unscathed. I don’t hurt as much as I’d suspect I would after 13 miles, but as Darin said, “There’s always tomorrow.”

I see that on a marathon training schedule I at least have to work up to a 4 hour run. Tough to contemplate that, but I guess there are a lot of training runs ‘twixt now and then.

Last Thursday, when winter officially showed up in these here parts with some rain, Rob, Nina, and I dithered on iChat about whether we should go running. We finally met up at 7:30am at Rancho San Antonio, in the rain, but we did the shorter Farm Trail rather than the longer, with-hills-included Wildcat Trail.

Today we agreed to go running near my house, at 7am so we could get a nice longish run in before we had to start our days. I opened Dashboard to see what the temperature was.

32.

Fahrenheit.

In California (not the Sierras part)?

We had on our cold weather gear, which meant we were only a little cold as we ran. I have a Vapor-Dry Hoodie (from Road Runner Sports) that has the neat fold-over hand cuffs to keep my hands warm, but I discovered that I really need my running gloves too if I’m going to, say, hold a bottle of water as I run. (Brrr.)

Running in the cold definitely helps you keep the pace up, because as Rob put it: “Keep moving, or die of exposure.” I bonked when we got to the hill in the middle of the run, and couldn’t keep up with Rob and Nina for a bit, but that was okay, because soon they reached the actual halfway point and came back to collect me.

When we passed the high school (the front lawn of which was white with frost), I said, “Do you realize that between today and last week, we are that much closer to earning our Hardcore Merit Badges?”

“Woo!”

It’s true. I realize what we’re doing is not quite the same level as doing the Dublin Marathon in the Irish rain, but the fact that Rob, Nina, and I are committed to doing our running despite the temperature or the weather conditions is a wonderful development. I’m not sure I’d run in less than sterling conditions without someone to run with — I used to always run by myself! And I still do sometimes, but I’m not quite at the point where I’m slavering to go whether I have company or not — but less than perfect-California-day conditions are becoming less of a factor!

I might not slack on my exercise so much this winter. Which would be a good thing. Yay, team.

I went to see the doctor this morning (thankfully, he was running late — I was running around like a maniac this morning trying to get the kids ready to go and get Simon to preschool before my appointment, and I ended up being late) to check on the progress of my thyroid meds. He had the results of my last blood test, and my TSH is at a much better level. It was 4.x when I got tested in May, which indicates a low thyroid; it’s now around 1.1, which indicates a much healthier level. And on every scale he was measuring me on, I’m evidently doing better.

Except one. Exercise is still wiping me out. I mentioned my two-hour run, two-hour nap pattern.

He said, “You’re doing too much. You’re overexerting yourself.” He shook his head. “Most of my patients I have to plead with to get some exercise. You, I have to tell to do less. Only thirty to forty-five minutes a day.”

I told him I wanted to do a marathon next year. He’s a former marathoner. He understands.

“It’s going to take some time for your body to adjust.”

Well, doing shorter runs throughout the week and suffering one long run/one long nap seems okay for the moment.

Update: My friend Rob IM’d me with, “I want your doctor!” A doctor who tells you not to get exercise…excellent, Smithers.