My Rave Run

I've been in my rural Minnesota hometown (population 2,500 and getting smaller) since July 20, and I will be here until Monday. I have several motivations for my lengthy stay at home. My mom was hospitalized for and diagnosed with seizures last month, and I wanted to accompany her to her follow-up doctor appointments. I also have upcoming family gatherings -- a reunion on Saturday and my grandma's 80th birthday party on Sunday.

Before loading up my Jeep a week and a half ago, I looked at my Chicago Marathon training schedule; my long runs consisted of 9-, 14- and 15-milers. I've previously run marathons, so the distance didn't scare me. Long runs are my friend. But the location in which I'd be doing these long runs frightened me.

I recalled running from my hometown of Tracy to Walnut Grove and back (7 miles each way) five years ago while training for my first marathon. I begged my sister, who hadn't been training for anything, to run with me. We shared a CamelBak. Between the rolling hills and sharing U.S. Highway 14 with cars and semi-trucks, I never wanted to cover that route again on only my feet. Yet, while I was home visiting two summers ago and training for the Twin Cities Marathon again, I decided to not only run that route, but also to run around my hometown first. I had a 20-miler on the schedule and, even though I was home, I intended to run it. This time my sister accompanied me on a bike. I was about 15 miles into the run when I slowed down and became almost delirious. I was exposed on the treeless highway, and I had started out too late. I was hot. And I was done. We called my father-in-law who picked us up. Thank God for my sister and her cell phone.

Despite those dreadful runs, I love Tracy and the thousands of acres of unharvested corn and soybean fields that currently surround it. Though, you won't ever see my town featured as a rave run in Runner's World. It has less than two miles of running/walking paths on the town's edge, near a small man-made lake pond. A run around town is about four miles long. Tracy's edges are mostly treeless and leave runners exposed to the often unforgiving wind and sun. And to run any serious distance means traveling, unless you want to run laps around town.
 
For this weekend's 14-miler, I drove to the Lake Shetek area which has a 6-mile paved trail. It's about 13 miles south of my  hometown. There, I encountered hills, wild flowers, prairie grass, men fishing, deer, rabbits, and, of course, the lake. While I had to run around the nearby town of Currie (population: 225) to make up additional miles, I loved this run. I had biked and run the path before, but I didn't appreciate its beauty until this past weekend.

I plan to return Saturday for my 15-miler. It may not be considered a rave run to the well-traveled runner, but it's a gem hidden in the cornfields of rural Minnesota. It's my rave run.