OFF ROAD RUNNING

1.3 mile trail loop

2 rnds with 5 min rest in between

"I started off at a steady pace, slowly warming up and looking for my groove. My consistency worked in my favor allowing me to pass many inexperienced runners who started off too fast. As they got weaker I got stronger. By now there is nothing but dead silence, except for the sound of my feet hitting the pavement. As usual, I found my niche, neither in the lead pack nor with mediocrity. I was in a place all by myself. Running… like a machine but not as robotic, unemotional and impersonal. Rather, I was more of an emotional runner, like my ancestors, running across the fruited planes, hunting their prey, running down the enemy to exact revenge, traversing through desolate terrain as a necessity for survival, methodically, instinctively, and naturally.
I hear their footsteps behind me now, the sound of a brigade, the sound of determination, and the sound of survival. Running in a loincloth, displaying tribal colors, and a hatched strapped to my back. A steady flow of sweat running down my entire body and pooling in my moccasins. Six miles to go and still running strong. Fueled by not only the will to survive but also the birthright to exercise my volition and become who I am. The enemy slows on the hill. Sensing his weakness I unemotionally accelerate, reaching over my shoulder with my right hand I remove the hatchet. The veins in my forearm protrude as I squeeze the life from the hard wood making it an extension of my limb. Out of respect for my enemy and the life and death struggle of nature, I exact a single blow, swift but deadly. I pass him and grow stronger.
Others are struggling, slowing, laboring and feeling sorry for themselves. I have nothing left inside my muscles. My fuel will come from somewhere else, from the past, from a dormant connection to nature that I can only revisit by running. I could not imagine quitting right now. Soldiers fight battles and win wars because they don’t quit; Indians conquer; lions eat, survive, and reproduce. The ones who quit either lost, were conquered, or starved to death. I’ll quit when I die. For now, I’ll keep running. Personal liberation, I thought, was the greatest release of energy I could experience. The decision to wake up from a long sleep, a life in the dark ages, walking alone on a desolate, war-torn battlefield with nothing more than emptiness, withering forms, cracks, and fissures, an existence shackled in both mind and body, far from free. Why wait when I can pardon myself, when I can liberate myself, when I can break the chains that bind me, when I can liberate myself and claim my birth right to not only survive and exist but to excel.
Two miles to go and I’m getting stronger, increasing my stride and using energy that seemingly came from nowhere. Approaching the finish line. Crossing alone, as usual, not in the lead pack nor with mediocrity but in a place all by myself."

-anonymous