Final Long Pre-Shamrock Run

Yesterday, I drove to North Carolina with my friend Nicki to attend our friend Faith's funeral service. It was a sad thing, especially to see more people who were older than the deceased than people who were younger. Why does someone that young with so much to live for have to die from a type of cancer that became curable more often than not 30 years ago?

Nicki and I are both running the Shamrock Half Marathon in two weeks, and since we missed Saturday training to go to Faith's funeral service, we decided to train this Sunday morning together. On the agenda were 12 miles, and we were joined by the first eight miles by Nicki's friend Maria. The 12 miles - 11.5 actually - were fairly uneventful. I continue to have left knee pain but it was not bad during the running. It does hurt more now that the run is finished. I am wondering if I have some ileo-tibial band issues going on? At least my legs did not act like the extreme left wing and extreme right wing that I poked some fun at the other day.

For our route today, we picked three separate four mile loops, each starting and ending at the lake. Despite snow coming in early tomorrow, we are in serious early spring right now in this area, and I enjoyed seeing the splashes of color as we ran along, with some walking on my part.

Our first circuit ran along Douglasdale and Portland through Windsor Farms, back through Carytown, and back to the park. Windsor Farms is an upscale and beautiful neighborhood, and color was provided by the spring flowers and by some quirky art work:
Our middle four mile loop went past the little lakes in Byrd Park, past Maymont, and through some of the neighborhoods. The photos are from Maymont: "Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam..." Scenic view of Maymont:

Our last loop, which we shortened to 3.5 miles, went into the fan and by VCU. I liked these colorful row homes, as well as the color provided by Mother Nature.