Two Down, One To Go (and one abandoned)

In January, I set down four fitness goals for the year.
This weekend, I achieved goal number two.

The first goal was to run a non-wissahickon trail race and not get lost. I actually managed to achieve that goal quite some time ago, back at the Ugly Mudder. And I've even got quite a little streak going, having stayed on course at Tyler, Double Trouble, and Half-Wit since then. One down.

Goal number two: Run The Four Corners. Goal achieved! That was the major event of this past weekend. Helen and I, along with fellow wanderers Chris Moore and Bob Reynolds, and joined brieflhy by Pete and Phil as well, set off at 7 am on Saturday morning. We started up at Northwestern, winded our way through the Andorra Nature Center, up Pain Hill, and across the yellow trail all the way to Buck Hill. We then went down Buck Hill and over to Valley Green to meet up with the usual Saturday morning crew.
A somewhat unusual approach, we then crossed the creek and took the white trail and all its outer versions out to Rittenhouse Town, crossed Lincoln, headed over to Ridge, back across Lincoln, and up the steps to pick up the very end of the yellow trail.
The odd part is that at that point, you've done three of the four corners, but you're soooo far from being finished. But we headed off, yellow trail back to Valley Green, then the bridge across to the white trail, the lavender trail (where we ran into Dad, Heidi, Tony, and Sophie), and finished up with that odd little stretch of Germantown Avenue. And we made it all the way! 21 miles, which we did in just under three and a half hours. Two down!
I'll say this, though – the very end was humbling for me. In the final part of the run, on the white and lavender trails, I didn't even have the energy to talk, and when everyone decided to speed up for the last stretch they left me in the dust. But I actually feel fine today, 2 days later.

The third goal awaits: run a marathon in less than 3 hours. I'm working on it.
The abandoned goal? More group rides. I should have done this last spring, but was caught up in other stuff. Right now, with my focus on marathon training, I've had to abandon it. So it'll be either .500 or .750. We'll know in a few months!