Lord willing, this is promising to be a unique weekend for me, with both a musical concert in Richmond and a race in the same historic city. The church organist at Notre Dame in Paris will be performing tomorrow night at the River Road Church.
Here he is playing Widor's incredible Toccata.
Then on Saturday, I've signed up to do a 10 miler on the Virginia Capital Trail.
I am quite familiar with this course, having run it in 2019 and having biked this trail probably some two dozen times.
It's an out and back course, with one giant uphill section on the out leg (see elevation chart above), which means (thankfully) a nice long downhill section on the return leg. The meteorologists are calling for a very nice day for running -- cool but sunny. The course can be windy, but despite the wind I was able to finish in under 2 hours three years ago.
Oddly enough, I just found out about this race today via email. The race organizers obviously have my email address because they sent me an invitation to run in the event. I usually plan my races in advance, but sometimes I just decide as things come up, as with this race. It's definitely a God thing that it dovetails so well with tomorrow night's organ concert in Richmond because, duh, we all like to save on gas money and so we try to group our errands and such like together. Personally, I can't think of something I'd rather do than spend a weekend enjoying great classical music along with a really challenging race to test my metal against some hardy competitors. This year I am only picking races I am extremely excited about. No more "shoulds" or "maybes." I'm still very very very much on the fence about my final marathon of the year, but right now it's looking like it will be Richmond (for the fourth time). It's close, convenient, and enjoys amazing crowd support. It's challenging as all get out. It's gorgeous, peaceful, and beautiful. You get to see all kinds of wildlife along the James River. And the best part is that the finish is all down hill.
I love to be racing again. I am happy.