Sabino Canyon adventure

All smiles!

Derek and I woke up REALLY early to meet some friends at Sabino Canyon for our group run. When I say "early" I am talking 4 A.M.. Ouch. When the alarm went off my husband was so disoriented that he didn't understand why we were getting up so early. I can't blame him; the sun wasn't even up yet!

Loving the wind in my hair.

We fueled for our canyon run with bananas smothered in peanut butter and all-natural fig bars.
We met up with our friends and started out on our run at about 5:30 A.M.. The weather was gorgeous and the canyon was so green! Surprisingly, or not surprisingly, there were many other people running and hiking the canyon at 5:30 A.M.. Aside from the early morning, I was so pumped to run with my group. I ran like the wiiiiiiind. [laugh] Just kidding, but I did manage a 9:30 min/mile pace for the first mile....after that it was ALL climbing. I was thankful that I've been training on the hills near my house. At least I had an idea of the pain I'd be going through. It was easy to ignore the discomfort when my surroundings were so stunningly beautiful. I didn't see many animals, but all the plants were so healthy and vibrantly green.

And did I mention that there was running water?! WATER.... in the desert.... what is this substance? [laugh] 

It was really green and very serene.

It was a beautiful morning run. Running up the canyon was as difficult as you'd imagine. I managed to run 2.25 miles up into the canyon. At that point I needed to eat something because I was running on fumes. I tried out Shot Blocks on this run. They were yummy and very chewy, and even better was that they went down easy and digested easy too. Success! I ran the 2.25 miles back after that. I didn't make it to the top of the canyon. From bottom to top, the canyon is 3.75 miles. I've got some improving to do. Now that I know how fun the run was, we will be returning NEXT Friday. Maybe it'll become my normal Friday routine? Hmmm.... that would mean waking up at 4 A.M. every Friday and I don't know if I want to commit to that.