The Run

In an effort to counteract my calorie intake, I went on a short, early morning jog on day three before our big day of hiking. I made the mistake of mentioning this to one of our guides, Filipe, who is active in many sports including rock climbing and trail running. Later that day, I was noncommittal when he suggested we run together the following morning.

 An aside: when I first met Filipe on day one, he immediately commented on my shoes which are trail-runners, which I am not one of. The shoes are good for lightweight hiking too which is why I bought them, but apparently they are shoes with good “trail cred.” He instantly pegged me as a trail runner, and I could not shake him from this belief even when I said things such as “I am not a trail runner.”

During dinner that night, Filipe again suggested we run in the morning. I reluctantly agreed to a few miles, and we traded what’s app info just in case. An hour or two later, he texted me a route he had decided upon, which was clearly a trail run, so I texted back and said, “I am not a trail runner, but I’ll try.”  Thumbs-up emoji, he replied.

In the morning, he bounced into the hotel lobby sporting a t-shirt from an ultra-marathon, then led the way to a rocky dirt trail, where I once again repeated that I don’t run trails. “No worries,” he said, and off we went while he man-splained the basics;  land on your toes, take shorter steps.  

All ended well, but I was plenty tentative. I tried to bail out a few times, but he wasn’t having it. We had to backtrack at one point to avoid overgrown terrain. Then, after assuring me we weren’t going to run all the way up the steep hillside, we ran all the way up the steep hillside. Finally, the route ended when we got back down to the bottom. No twisted ankle for me thanks, probably, to my stellar shoes. But I think he gets it now: I’m not a trail runner.