Mind Games Part 2: Attitude Adjustment

Of course, just one recovery run isn’t enough to erase doubt and boredom.  The next Saturday, I missed the club run, so I had to go out later in the day to run. 

I do think the end of winter running season is the hardest time of year to get motivated.  You’re sick of the cold, sick of the ice, and sick of doing laundry of all those layers.  I decided to take the opportunity and run in an area I hadn’t been in a long while, to distract me from how much time this run was going to take.  It’s a town that has a plethora of bike trails connecting the subdivisions, and part of the fun is getting lost within the various backyard trails.  However, it was Easter Weekend, so my mind was wishing I was enjoying the fun of family and celebration rather than running.

The start didn’t bode well, as I ended up back near the start on the first trail and a dead end at the second.  Soon, I was at one of my favorite forest preserves and decided that running the trail around it, then heading back to the car, was good enough.

While doing that loop, I had an epiphany.  According to our club leader’s training plan, these long runs weren’t about logging miles as much as pushing them at a pace, something I wasn’t doing.  I decided right there and then that I needed to pick up the pace on the Saturday runs so that Sunday’s runs were true recovery, where I was going to be tired from Saturday’s effort. 

I picked up the pace and ran back to the car.  Of course, when I stopped my Strava, I noticed that it had paused about right when I started going faster.  Well my legs would remember what my phone neglected to record.  The important part, to pick up the pace and really work on mentally pushing myself, had happened.

What has surprised me, more than anything, is how much faster I am running just by having a positive attitude.  By keeping myself focused on the task at hand and having a can-do attitude has taken serious time off the clock.  (Of course, so has running all the miles I’ve been doing.)  I’m now thinking that anything is possible again.

Mind Games, Part 1

I’ve been running mile after mile after mile, but it doesn’t seem like I get any faster.  It’s what makes running—actually, any athletic endeavor—a challenge:  your mind.  Mine is more that my brain moves at the speed of light, but my feet struggle to do a mile under 10 minutes.  Long runs are both a constant stream of conscious and a constant feed of “I’m bored.  I’m so flipping bored.  How much longer do I have to be bored?”

Of late, I’m disappointed with my slow, slugglish pace when I upload my run.  It’s very discouraging when I’ve done so much speed work and run my recovery miles, yet rather than improve, I am still at 12+ min pace, rather than the 10:30 pace I’m trying to reach.  I don’t have a choice here; to qualify for Boston I have to be able to run a marathon near 9 min pace, and even if I’m wearing a charity bib, almost all the runners finish before five hours.

It’s always been a struggle to get motivated to do the longer runs of marathon training because they take hours, and then I’m spent all day.  Add in winter where I’m not running as much during the week, and I feel even slower.  I had started dreading the long run, the time, the boredom….and I wanted a distraction.  Of course, I’m the type of runner who when distracted, slows down even more.  Not helpful. Also not helpful…not having a big race on the horizon because there’s no PR for me to chase.  I needed a reboot, a way to push myself through, to maximize my limited time with mileage.

About a month ago, I started out on my Sunday recovery run, feeling sluggish and slow, tired and battling a headache.  While it was a recovery run, I did have a deadline:  the sunset.  My route would take me on trails that closed at sunset, 7:05 pm, so that was the cutoff.

After about a mile and a half, I hit a stoplight and checked my watch:  6:34 pm.  I thought about the route and guesstimated that I would really have to push myself to finish the trails in a half hour.

The trail coursed through the local high school’s athletic fields and then followed some power lines.  It seemed like I could not get out of the high school area, but as I turned onto the trail at the power lines, I could see the trail all the way to the golf course.  “Oh, that’s not so far,” I thought.  “Maybe I can do this.”  I coursed down the hill, and as I crested the hill by the golf course, I checked my watch again.  6:47 pm.  18 minutes is totally doable.

I ended up leaving the park at 6:58 pm, about seven minutes ahead of schedule.  My next deadline was to finish in under an hour, or 7:15 pm.  It was about two miles, so well under my usual pace.  I pushed onwards and hoped for the best.

As I made the last turn towards home, I was surprised again.  7:08 pm.   I had reached two goals I didn’t think possible on a day like today.  It’s amazing what happens when you make up your mind to do something…..

(to be continued)

Rivalries and Nerves (Marathon Training, Week 18)

Six days before my first marathon in the quest, and nervous wreck.  Why?  A rivalry.

Now, I love friendly rivalries, the ones that push both of us to do our best and come from a place of friendship and caring.  It encourages me to be a better runner and person.  But there are also times where my Type A competitive nature gets the best of me. 

There’s a girl in the area who when I switched back to running, tried to take me “under her wing.”  While I appreciated her insight, she didn’t seem to understand that my goals and attitudes about running were very different.  I’ve been doing this competitive athlete thing a very long time.  I’ve been the kid too slow to make the varsity team when the team qualified for the state finals, and I’ve been the adult skater who was in first place at Adult Nationals.  I’ve weathered through illness and injury, but I’ve also struggled with motivation and confidence.  If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that your passion has to be in the process of training.

When we first met, I assumed, based on her constant signing up for races, that she was just as passionate about going out and running.  Nope.  She really didn’t do a lot of training runs, spent quite a bit of time nursing various aches and pains, and was tied to her walk/run intervals.  Plus, her attitudes and advice were definitely shaped by having the financial means to purchase gear and sign up for races.  Not only am I on a tight budget, but much of it didn’t exist when I started running. 

I really don’t care about other people’s running journey, since karma dictates that you will get out of the sport what you put into it.  But I’m not perfect, and her attitude just pushed my buttons.  Perhaps it was that she didn’t have the work ethic.  Perhaps I was jealous that I couldn’t afford some of the stuff she did.  When I saw her, I would work harder, run further, go faster, and for most of the summer, I was ahead of her. 

Well, in the past few weeks, she’s started to push herself, closing in on me.  On Sunday, she broke 5 hours in the marathon, a goal that I’ve been working so hard to do.  My heart just sank, and it triggered my past mental demons, from both skating and running.  I was nervous, thinking, “What if I’m not faster than her on Sunday?  If I’m not as fast as I want to be, can I redo?”  A long deep chat with the boyfriend eased the jittery feelings, but not the nerves. 

On Monday, one of my skating friends, trying to practice her Silver Moves test, posted the following advice to herself:  Do your best, and do it with joy.  It was the message I needed to hear.  I need to focus on my own race and not worry about what everyone else is doing.  Especially someone who is on a very different journey.

In less than 24 hours, Marathon #1.  A little excited, a little nervous, ready to do my best, and ready to do it with joy.

Baby Steps

I had a case of the Mondays this week.

Life is stressful and overwhelming and insane.  God doesn’t pile on your plate any more than you can handle.  Even so, you hit that point where you are staring at a to-do list, not sure what to even start next.

I hit that wall on Tuesday.  Just like when I hit a wall on a run, I thought to myself, “Just do one step.  Just deal with one piece of paper.”  Soon one thing was done, then another, and I was back at it.

One step at a time.  Baby steps.

Wednesday I woke up with a sore throat and chills, which by Friday was clearly illness.  Ugh.  I still have to work.  Still have to be functional at home.  Still need to quest.

One step at a time.    Baby steps.

I originally planned to do the Wisconsin Marathon in May.  I haven’t been able to run in two weeks.  I’m about to go into my most stressful project at work, which has a deadline three weeks before the marathon.  I’m starting to think, “well, maybe I should just do the half.  Maybe I should skip this year.”

Then I remembered that Boston and London are in April.  2nd quarter is always my most stressful at work, so I’m often skipping workouts this time of year.  Before I plunk down the money for London, I need to learn how I’m going to make running a priority this time of year.   I’m signing up for the Wisconsin marathon.

One step at a time.  Baby steps.

The goal isn’t a time or a placement, but to learn how to make running a priority when work is stressful.  I can completely tell how better my mood is when I’m running regularly than when I’m not, which should help me be a happier, healthier employee.

One step at a time.  Baby steps.

I’m still sick, I’m still woefully behind in my laundry, I’m still trying to clear out the email inbox of doom.  Somehow I have to figure out how to get my life away from work under control before work occupies all of my brain time.

So I’m processing one thing at a time.  One load of laundry.  One email.  One baby step.

Sometimes, you need to ground yourself…

Last night, I was invited to a party at a watering hole.  I wasn’t planning to go, thinking it was too far away from home.  After making a very important delivery, I discovered I was, two hours before the party started, in the right neighborhood.  I could stop, have dinner, and wait for everyone else to show up.  I’m single.  Last night was Valentine’s Day.  I had every excuse in the world to enjoy a night out with adult beverages and friends who don’t care about romance. 

In order to complete this quest, I need to be disciplined.  I need to sacrifice a bit of fun today for an adventure tomorrow.  I need to commit to training plans, healthy diet, and simplified lifestyle. 

This past week has been none of those things.  I still don’t have a single clean winter running outfit.  My .pst folder on Outlook is getting queasy trying to swallow the email backlog.  I have a long list of birthday thank you notes to send.  And…I think two credit cards are lost in my very disheveled purse.  We won’t even discuss that I haven’t run in a week or that I haven't been watching my diet.  I feel bloated, slow, and off track.

I decided to drive right past the bar and straight home.  Quests are about stepping away from your normal lifestyle and habits to journey towards a goal.  Last night, it was saying no to a party that would be fun, but would have gotten me home late, which would have led to feeling tired and lethargic all day.  Instead, I arrived home at a time where I was able to get some email deleted before going to bed early.  I woke up this morning, refreshed and focused towards what needed to be accomplished--and I even took some baby steps forward.

In order to complete my quest, I need to slow down my crazy active social life until I am training regularly, eating healthy, and organized enough to tackle the six races and corresponding charity fundraising.  While friends are a key component to this journey, I am faced with a challenge that I can only overcome on my own.

It’s been a rough start, but I’m determined to make this quest happen!