Inspiration Point

At four o’clock on Friday I could have kept going. It had been one of those weeks where work doesn’t so much fill the calendar as lean on it. Long days, a brain wrung out by Monday night, and Thursday’s run lost entirely.

So I made a rule out loud, to no one: check that the things that have to get done today are done, and then I’m breaking. I’m heading out. I’m getting my Friday miles in.

The week hadn’t been empty of running. Monday I nearly talked myself onto the couch and went anyway. Tuesday the sun came up behind the mountains before work. Wednesday I ran the Bay trail in the dark with my friend Brian, and halfway in the sky turned over into one of those sunrises you don’t try to photograph. Those are my morning miles. They start the day.

Friday miles are different. They close something.

Up Palo Corona

The route starts at sea level, a few blocks from Carmel River State Beach. The first three miles are flat and forgiving: along the river, out toward Rio Road, legs remembering what they’re for. It’s where the week starts to drain out of you.

Then the trail tilts up into Palo Corona and the conversation in your head gets short. The fourth mile climbs more than 500 feet at close to a ten percent grade. My heart rate went to 171. There is no room up there for the inbox, the meeting that ran long, the thing you didn’t finish. There’s the next switchback, and your breath, and the gate somewhere above you.

I’ve run this climb more times than I can count. It never gets easy. That’s part of why it works.

Inspiration Point

At the top, about 600 feet up, the land opens. Monterey Bay curves away to the north. Below, the river finds the ocean at Carmel River Beach, the same sand I started from an hour earlier. The town sits in the trees. From up here the week looks its actual size.

Two Fridays ago I stood in this exact spot after a few weeks away from training. I’d gotten a little burned out on running. Some places put you back in touch with it faster than others. For me, this is one of them.

Back down

The descent off the gate takes about five minutes, a third of the time the climb does. Gravity does most of the work, and the mind is free to wander back toward the week. But it comes back different.

Here’s what I’ve learned about leaving on a Friday with work unfinished. I have never once regretted a run. Not one, even on the days I walked away from things that weren’t done and could wait. The unfinished things are still there in the morning. They were always going to be. What changes is the person who picks them up.

Morning miles to open the day. Friday miles to close the week. And when I can make it all the way up to Inspiration Point, that’s the good one.

Then the flat miles back along the river, to the sand I’d started from, and the week still the size it had looked from the top.

Run notes

Friday, October 2, 2026. Out the door at 4:15 p.m. from Carmel River State Beach to Inspiration Point, Palo Corona, and back. 8.7 miles, 1,060 feet of climbing, a high point around 610 feet, 1:12:06 moving, heart rate averaging 148 and topping out at 171.

On the listen this week: Cameron Hanes's run playlist on Spotify, and his podcast. Also in rotation: the Rich Roll Podcast (since day one), Huberman Lab, Jay Shetty's On Purpose, Jan Frodeno's Frodeno Going Mental, Blake Mycoskie's No Magic Pill, and a16z for the AI side.