Mmm…munching on gnocchi with pesto after what was my best run in recent memory. I don’t know if it was my mood (maybe I should always start off a run grumpy and distracted?), the music (standout track: “Where Is the Love?,” by the Black-Eyed Peas, BPM a mere 94), or the timing (I went out in the evening), but everything just felt perfect. I switched up my two-mile and three-mile routes and ran them out of order, so maybe I tricked myself into thinking it was a shorter run? I think the dusk played a factor, the dying light playing tricks and making me feel speedier. Also, I think I was distracted by the scenery, because, unlike the mid-mornings when I usually run, people are out walking their dogs en masse when it’s a clear and cool evening in August in Cleveland. I had to step around a dog/walker pair at least every block. Saw only two other runners, though: a real jock running shirtless (probably a JCU athlete, newly back on campus), and a young skinny guy with a bouncy gait wearing a shirt from Second Sole (where I’ve never been, and which reminded me that they have a running club that I must check out).

Whatever it was tonight, I am the closest to high from running I’ve ever been. I felt spry and lithe and gazelle-like and indefatigable. I felt like I’d won the race when I pounded into my driveway as the sun went down, and was unsurprised to see that I’d run faster than I expected. Though I have been trying to run more slowly than race pace (my last race, the half, was at 10:11, so I’m aiming for 11:00 or so) on long-ish runs, I think I ran these five miles between 9:45 and 9:30, so it was an unintentional tempo run, I guess.

ONLY one drawback: I realized at about mile 4.9 that my blister from these moccasins (photo from Target.com) had not, in fact, completely healed. But I’m over it.