Luke - 16

16mi, 2:03:51 (7:44)
After camping Friday and Saturday nights, Zack, Matt, and I headed out in the morning to Waldo Lake and met our friends Jeff, Josh, and Renee for a run.  The loop around the lake was 22 miles, but the three of us that had done 14 on Saturday planned on only doing 8 or so.  About 4 miles in when I mentioned that we were due to turn around soon, Zack vetoed it, and Josh convinced us to go 16, and they could do their 22 and pick up the cars and drive back to us.  The trails were beautiful, probably the best run as far as terrain and scenery that I've ever done.  At least top 5.  Josh and Renee had their two dogs with them, and one had a backpack with gels, water, and gatorade, so we were good on nutrition for the run.  I felt fantastic...I hadn't looked at my watch the entire run until Jeff asked me how long we'd been going; I expected to be a bit under an hour, but we were at 96 minutes already.  The end came up unexpectedly; I thought we had a couple more miles when we got to the parking lot at 16 and I felt like I could have easily gone 20.  When we stopped at 16 and all got water, Matt decided he'd do the full 22, so the four of them and one dog left and Zack and I and the other dog hung out at the lake and got in the water a bit (Zack more than me; it was too cold for me to swim around in).  A little less than an hour later Josh and Renee came running back on the trail they'd left on...apparently they'd taken a wrong turn so since 22 was their absolute limit they came straight back and Jeff and Matt were gonna do the 24 or 25 that it would take to get back to the cars.  A couple and their dog who Josh and Renee happened to know were also there, so the six of us and the three dogs hung out on a dock for a long time.  We were wondering what happened to Jeff and Matt because they were super late.  When they finally got back, it turned out they'd taken some more wrong turns and gone about 29 miles!  The cars had food in them so we all devoured everything in sight before heading out.  On the way back into town we stopped at a pizza place and took down about a half-pizza each.  Great day, great weekend.