Countdown

See that countdown on the right?  Yep. Less than 20 days until that darn Marathon.  Am I excited?  Sure.  I’m excited for it to be over.  This 4-month training has been anything but ideal.  Between a quad tear that knocked me out for a good 2 months and the death of my dad, my heart, body, diet, & mind just aren’t holding up like I’d like them to.

So on 10/21/12 I’m going to need some serious “internet cheering”. Got it? Good 🙂

Last weekend was my scheduled 20-miler.  I made it to 15 and my body said “done”. I didn’t run out of juice or enthusiasm, but my body hurt in ways that couldn’t push through 5 more miles of training.  If it were a race I would have gladly pushed through the pain.  Since I only have 3 weeks til race day, I’m in prime “injury zone” and wouldn’t have enough time to heal properly and confidently to cover 26.2 miles on race day.  So I scaled back and laughed at how ridiculous I sounded by saying “I’m so disappointed I only ran 15 miles today”. HA!  Dumb.

So the tapering continues.  I love tapering but I hate the psychological stress that comes with it.  There’s an article somewhere that when in the “tapering time frame” of training, your mind and body starts playing tricks on you.  You feel every single pain and worry it to death that you’re hurt or coming down with a cold.  Normally I’d take the time to find it to back up my statement with research, but we’re all friends here, so you’ll just have to trust me this time! 🙂

I’ve visited the race website several times every day making sure I’ve got everything covered.  Course map, elevation, aid stations, race start, expo info…you name it, I want it to be second nature.
I promise…cupcake reviews NEXT! Yum!

Route 66 10K Recap

56:05.  6.2 miles. 9:03/mile (average), 15th out of 47 in my age group.  Woof.  Don’t get me wrong, that is a great performance (not compared to the crazies), but each race brings about “lessons learned”. The morning started out like any other, until I got out of bed.  “What…?”, you say?  It was one of those mornings that I just felt “off”.  I get out of bed to appease my bladder, and I feel a strange pull/soreness in my upper right quad that I can’t remember if I felt the day before or not.  I did a quick analysis of most recent workouts: “Yesterday (Friday) was an Off Day, Thursday was bike, elliptical, and arms day…no “leg” workouts or running since Wednesday”.  Hmm…odd.  Well it stayed sore & tight all morning.  Fortunately, a few minutes into the race, it seemed to “go away” and didn’t seem to bother my performance.  If you gotta be injured, that’s a good one to have, right runners?! 🙂

Another “off” item was my tummy.  I’ve been nutritioning well all week.  Except for that margarita on Sunday (that shouldn’t have done it) and a few bites of Laffy Taffy on Friday (possible culprit) and that “No Sugar Added” Blue Bunny ice cream on Friday night (most likely culprit).  For now, I will continue to reminisce the days that I didn’t have such problems before a race…Ok, fine, that’s never happened.  A girl can dream, right?

So needless to say, I was pretty nervous.  Not to mention it was looking to be hot & sunny and 6.2 miles is farther than 3.1 miles.  Can I “bust it out” for a solid 6.2 miles like I’ve trained my brain to do in a 5K?  I had to keep telling myself to just run it like a regular Sunday training run…I can always maintain my 5K pace during long training runs, but fret during a race and somehow can’t seem to “hold” that pace.  So much psychology in running.

The first 2 miles were a bit challenging: brick roads, hills, lots of turns (hard on the joints), and lots of fasties passing me.  But once we got onto the bike trails (my beloved trails) it was a delicious run.  Flat, shady, and I know random distances on those trails like the back of my hand.  Again, psychology.  I knew once I got on those trails I’d be fine.  I know the distances, the elevation, and certain landmarks to tell me where I am and how much farther to go on the course.  Oh, psychology.  What a difference it makes.

Another lesson, which I’m surprised I’ve just now realized this: smile while you run.  Ok, ok…I can’t seem to force myself to smile either. Middle ground: relax your face.  I have a habit of grimacing toward the end of a race or training run.  It’s hotter, harder, I’m tired, and my body hurts.  Grimacing is a natural human reaction.  I’m not sure what made me realize this for a second between mile 4 & 5, I relaxed my face. “It” (running) didn’t seem to hurt as much.  It didn’t seem to be a chore.  Now THIS psychology lesson is also pretty cool. Remember in Psych 101 when we learned forcing a smile when you are unhappy, tired, angry, frustrated, etc. will convince your brain that you are happy?  Bingo.  Relaxed face = happy runner.  Smiling or not.  (It was too hot for me to smile, sorry).

But I WAS happy because I knew I was on track to finish under 1 hour, which was my general goal for this race.  I always have “dream goals” and my “general goals” for my races.  For instance, in the Alton Half Marathon, I was secretly hoping to finish at the 2 hour mark (give or take a few minutes).  I didn’t, I finished in 2:09:00 BUT I beat my time from my previous half marathon but 11 minutes (not bad for only being back in the saddle for 3 months) and I ran without foot pain.  Goals accomplished.  During this race, I was secretly hoping for a 54:00 finish time, but would be happy with anything under 1 hour.  Had I remembered to factor in the .2 miles in my pace, I would have accomplished that goal.  Oh well, lessons learned…