Today's task: 1 mile easy, 4 miles @7:40 min/mile (medium tempo), 1 mile easy
Today's weather: 36 degrees, crisp and clear
Today's outcome: 1 mile easy, 4 miles @7:28 min/mile, 1 mile easy
False. The hardest step for this runner is the first one out of bed. I've been burning the midnight oil for far too long now, and it feels like the dead of night when my alarm goes off in the morning. I had a little help from Camryn today, when she came into my room after I first hit snooze to tell me her toe hurt. I walked her back to bed and mustered up the strength not to get back into my own. Once I'm up, the first step out the front door is cake.
Today's run felt great. It was still plenty dark outside (with the exception of a full-ish moon, bright stars, and some Christmas lights), so there wasn't a whole lot to distract me from the task at hand. I felt surprisingly awake and focused, which are two things I haven't felt in a while. I think I was just excited to get out there and run this morning because of a little something-something that showed up in my mailbox yesterday:
Much to my surprise, the results of last weekend's Surf-n-Santa 10 miler were updated, and somehow I moved from 4th place in my age group to 3rd place. I KNOW!!! I let out a yelp when I opened the bubble mailer it came in, and my girls looked at me like I was nuts. Ryan and I are always always always telling them that we never win anything at our races, but what's important is that we do our best. I feel I did just that for this race, and by sheer luck of the field of runners, I managed to place this time around. My rank for females went from 31 to 28 (what a beautiful number!), and overall went from 139 to 138. Sweet!
Santa earned himself a spot on my Christmas tree
This little trinket is so special to me for a number of reasons. I finally broke through to the top 10 in my age group in a J&A race, which has been a goal of mine all year, and it feels awesome to have something physical to show for it. I've worked really hard to speed up over the past few months, and this feels like a nice little pat on the back. But I think what matters the most is the fact that this was not an easy race. The weeks leading up to this race were tough on me mentally and physically, and the actual conditions on race day were quite challenging as well. This 4x4 coaster with a picture of Santa riding a wave will remind me that excuses are bullshit. I have it in me to run well when I'm tired. Cold? Raining? 30 mph headwinds for a few miles? So what. Run hard anyway. If I don't, somebody else will.
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