Andrew Schrauben

4th of July weekend I set out for the fourth time in my new inline skates; my previous three sorties carried me 7.5, 7.5, and 5 miles. I figured it was time to stretch into the double digits so I drove over to the White Pine Trail and laced up the boots.

Almost three hours later I arrived back at the car after covering 33.4 miles! I felt great - yes, I was definitely tired, and my heart rate had been 150-170 (that's above "easy run" range for me) the whole way - but I was nowhere near toasted. My quads felt a bit crampy over the last half hour but not painful. Before setting out I was confident that I could finish 30+ miles, but I never thought I'd cover it in 2:58 and still have some pep left over.

Last Sunday I talked Amanda into joining me on the White Pine Trail again, but instead of skates she was riding her bike. The night before she kept telling me "I think I only want to go to Rockford" (that's an 8 mile round trip) and I assured her that we'd just go until she got tired then turn around since it's uphill going north and downhill back south.

After riding and skating for an hour I asked her to check her bike computer and it read 10 miles, but we hadn't turned around yet! I knew that Amanda had been selling herself short the night before. We continued on since Amanda felt OK still, but within a couple miles she wanted to turn around. I pressed her on for another mile since then we could say we did a marathon.

And we did, going 26.8 miles in 2:31 although strangely I felt more tired than after my 33-miler. Amanda totally bonked at the two-hour mark and we inched along for about 10 minutes until her system finally rebooted and we cruised back to the car.

As impressive as it felt to be skating along at 11 mph for 2-3 hours, it blows me away that elite runners would've dusted me! I skated a 2:30 marathon and folks out there can run that same distance in less time. Wow.