I chose to head for Latta Plantation again since there were many trails I had not ran on the time before. This time I chose a route on the west part of the nature preserve. Not only was I anxious to see new trail, I was also ready to break in some new trail running shoes. I had wanted a new pair of trail running shoes when I read a tweet from @SeriousRunning about a 50% off sale at Xterra Footwear. I jumped on the website and ordered the only color they had left in a size 11. And wouldn't you know it, they were bright orange. My endurance rider friends could have only guessed I would have picked these shoes regardless since all my tack is bright neon orange. It was all too fitting. I received the shoes the day before. Unfortunately they did not fit my arch. So I ended up getting a pair of Dr. Scholls Gel Athletic insoles. They shoes now felt pretty good. So off I was off to brake them in on their virgin run.Todays Couch to 10k workout again consisted of 7min runs done 6 times with 2min walks in between. Along with 5min walking warmup and cooler down, this workout was 58min long. I started my warmup on Hill Trail and circled back around the equestrian parking lot and crossed the main road to continue on the trail. A half mile down I came to Shady Trail and took a left. This was a nice gravel trail that weaves back behind the Carolina Raptor Center. This stretch took me about a mile before I hit the road and worked my way down towards the lake.
At the lake I joined up with the Audubon Trail. This trail was quite technical and slow going, much like Cove Trail. However, the obsticles were not rocks. This time it was tree roots. The trail went up and down quickly along the lake and traversing the roots was harder than picking through rocks. This trail also had a bunch of fun foot bridges to cross. Finally got through the worse of it and hit a nice single track trail that eventually brought me out to a parking area.I ran up the road a ways and took a left on a gravel drive that went to the Historic Plantation home site. From there I took a right and proceeded to Buzzard Rock Trail. After Buzzard Rock I took a right on to Catawba Trail. After a mile I came out by the canoe rental and followed the road to Treasure Tree Trail. This trail was marked with numbers, which I believe corresponded with species of trees that it was placed with. This was a fun but tricky trail again with tree roots. It too had another set of fun foot bridges to jump on and run over.
My workout was winding down so I hit Hill Trail and turned to run around the barn and show arenas. By this time my cool down had begun and I walked on towards my truck in almost perfect timing with a finishing distance of 5.5miles.
As I started out on my first run session, it took me almost that whole 7 minutes to feel like I'd warmed up. I was feeling so good after that first session, that I continued to run through the walk sessions. I ended up only walking at the halfway point for a couple minutes. The rest of the time I decided to keep running. Though there were times, especially up hills and through those rooty sections, that I almost decided to walk. Yet I pushed on.
Over all the shoes felt pretty good considering this was the first workout in them. They did rub me just a tad on the arch, but nothing that will slow me down. Apart from the shoes, I'm still having some issue with my right ankle. This is an issue that has stopped me from running in the past so I'm being really cautious. Taking my days off is really important right now as I build my body up. Hopefully my ankle will strengthen up as I go.
I just thought this was a cool tree and took a pic to share. As you can see it grew horizontal and had two trunks. Between was almost a perfect height seat. 
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