Week in Review Snapshot:
Mileage: 39 miles (Workouts 0.0, Long 12, Easy 15.4, Race Pace 13.1)
Coming off of a great 3 weeks of training including a PR during training on the half marathon as well a very scenic 12 miler through the countryside, I thought this week would be great. And I was wrong. I felt totally gassed on Monday and Tuesday morning and let myself rest and recover after the two long runs over the weekend. I got out Wednesday for a good easy run and was feeling good. I had planned on doing a workout and some more easy miles over the next two days followed by a half marathon effort on Saturday to end my week. Unfortunately, I went to a local Indian buffet for lunch on Wednesday and showed zero self-restraint.
I hadn’t felt great going into the restaurant, but nevertheless I polished off a plate of Naan, rice, a pretty gnarly vegetable dish, a bowl of garlic chicken, some Saag and a piece of Tandoori chicken. I followed up with a second plate of equal proportions and finished it all off with some rice pudding and a couple gulab jamun. I hadn’t eaten this much since Thanksgiving and the curry was weighing heavy. After an all night bout with involuntary eruptions I was completely exhausted and dehydrated on Thursday morning, so no running for me.
Besides my own illness (if you can call it that), my wife had been home all week with the flu then I got a call from the school nurse that my daughter was also sick and she had to miss Thursday and Friday which required me to adjust my work and training schedule (if you can say I even have a training schedule). Friday morning I still felt weak, but I gave it a go and managed 7 easy miles and felt that I had somewhat salvaged what was otherwise a poor training week. It still wasn’t great, but managing two runs during such a terrible week was somewhat of a silver lining I suppose. That evening I made plans to run long with my brother-in-law, but he texted back early in the morning to inform me that he had become ill and wouldn’t be able to make it. I had been sleeping in my sleeping bag on the couch for 3 or 4 days and I was starting to feel the effects. I was still exhausted and played around with the idea of just lounging there and taking the day off, but for some reason I decided to get up and go get dressed. It was already 6:30, which is really, really late for me to start a run.
After my watch had synced up I didn’t think much about what exactly I wanted to run, I just hit start and took off. Over the first 400 meters or so I decided I would just go for about 8 miles at my target half marathon pace and see how I felt. I’m targeting a 7:20 minutes/mile pace for my upcoming race, and so two weeks out and after a bad training week I thought 8 miles at race pace would be a good measure. After 5 miles I was consistently coming in about 10 to 15 seconds fast, but I was feeling good so I decided to keep the pace where it was. I thought, let’s just see where this goes, and the thought of going for the full 13.1 entered my mind.
After 8 miles I was still feeling good but starting to feel the beginnings of fatigue. At 9 miles I was starting to be in pain but the pace hadn’t slipped. When 10 miles clicked over my internal alarm systems were starting to sound and I was in full on panic mode. I had worked so hard and was so far ahead of my PR pace and I just knew I was going to end up bonking at 11 miles and have to walk the last 2 and it would all be for naught.
I felt my heart rate rising and was absolutely struggling, but somehow I just kept grinding through it and when I got to 12.75 miles I knew I would make it. I hit 13.1 at 1:35:21, breaking my PR by almost 6 minutes. I didn’t feel like running any further, so I ended up walking back to my house, which was right at 1 mile away. During my walk, the thrill of hitting a new PR was tempered by a simple thought: why, at this point in my life, was I still trying to hit new PR’s? Why as an adult am I running so hard in a solo training session that I literally almost passed out?
Coincidentally, the marathon trials were being held in Atlanta only a few hours later and I was excited to watch the best Americans compete for the right to become Olympians. They would undoubtedly run mile upon mile in the sub 5 minute range, and here I was pushing myself to my absolute limit even though I am well beyond my glory days, which were themselves nowhere near such world class times. So why should I be out here working so hard to run a 7:20 minute/mile pace? There are millions of people faster than me. I thought about this over my 18 minute walk home and while I didn’t come to a conclusion, I did have a few realizations.
Most importantly, I enjoy running. It’s similar to how I enjoy playing adult league basketball and soccer. I don’t have to give those up just because Lebron James and Lionel Messi are better than me. They’re better than everyone. Just because you’re not the best and there’s no professional contract waiting for you doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t go out and race as hard as you like. There’s plenty of things more important than running fast, but it doesn’t hurt to shoot for personal goals either. They are by definition personal. So, maybe that’s not the best answer in the world, but how hard or easy you choose to pursue your goals is purely up to you. I hope you can also go out and set a new PR or run a new distance or achieve whatever running goal you have for yourself, but most importantly, I hope you can get out there and just enjoy the pleasure of running as much as I do.
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