Today's task: 12 miles @8:50 min/mile
Today's weather: sunny, 33 degrees at start, 45 degrees at finish, SW winds ~7 mph
Today's outcome: 12 miles in 1:41:42 (8:28 min/mile)
I love this quote because it bears so much truth. I was feeling pretty lousy when I woke up this morning...yesterday's sneezing fits left me with a killer headache and a sore neck, and the day before's stomach issues had me feeling pretty drained in general. Here I am on Thursday, just before a 2.5 hour nap, cuddled up with my Shamrock finisher blanket and wearing the Surf n Santa hoodie I've been living in since that race 3 weeks ago:
J&A Racing hooks us up with the best goodies...without their swag, I'd be running naked! Back to today...while 12 miles no longer terrifies me, I still consider it a daunting task, and I was not feeling up to the challenge. Then my iPad jingled with the delivery of today's Mile Post running quote of the day:
Ugh...fiiiiiiine. This quote was all I needed to push today's annoyances aside and get focused on the run. I got off to a chilly start, with my teeth chattering for the first mile, but the sun felt great and the temps rose up through the 30s pretty quickly. Mentally, I broke the run down into four quarters, which made it seem to zoom by. For the first time ever, I had to take a pit stop to tinkle at one of the hotels along the oceanfront. Anyone remember the track on Adam Sandler's cd called "The Longest Pee"?
After my potty stop, it was back on the road, up and over Rudee Inlet (I'm really enjoying running over that bridge...the more you do it, the easier it gets, right?) and back down General Booth to Red Wing Park where my car was. I felt myself pick up the pace a bit for the last two miles, which I'm not really supposed to do on these long slow runs, but I was feeling good and sped up with reckless abandon.
Finishing a 12 mile run and feeling like you could have easily done a couple more miles might be one of the greatest feelings in the world for this novice marathoner. Next week's 14 miler has been looming in my brain this week (I've never run farther than 13.1), but after today, I'm excited to get out there and do it. I'm still having a hard time wrapping my brain around 26.2 miles, but with each passing week, I'm gaining confidence that I might actually be able to pull this off. I'm pretty excited that I didn't feel the need to use my GU on this run, and recovering with some plain old H2O and my neighbor's incredible banana bread seems to be doing my body good. My neck is still sore, but my headache is gone and my lungs feel clear. Between the sweat and the saltwater in the air at the oceanfront, I consider myself cured.
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