Lock and Load

Well Saturday was race day, and boy was it ever. If you were to put everything that you don't want to happen on race day in a hat, I drew them all. I had no sleep, my ride was late, my esteem was low, it was pouring rain and freezing and there was a giant head wind. Lining up with my pace group was really intimidating, and before gun time I considered bowing out. For some reason, the day before I had to continually mentally talk myself into this one. I think a lot of my nervousness had to do with my very poor performance in my last half.

Less the never, I showed up. I ran. I conquered.

There was a lot more support there than I had anticipated for an inaugural race. We were told it was a really flat course, but someone was either lying to delirious. Running uphill is exponentially more difficult with a current of fallen rain, but we persevere. Mental frailty will not give you satisfactory results, so sometimes you have to convince yourself that your the biggest, baddest runner out there-even if you know you aren't. That's what running is about anyway right? Believing that you can push yourself to do something you probably weren't made to do.

The decision was made early in the race that I wasn't going to walk one single step, unless forced at a water station. I decided that no matter what, I had to be going at the pace of at least a speed walk. You know the lies we tell ourselves to make things a little easier on the ego? Like Oh, it's ok to walk you've done so well so far! Those nice little sweet nothings that justify an action? Well, I was mean. I was really mean to myself. If I told you what I was saying to myself, you would probably be disappointed.

To get through this race, I did everything in my power to keep pushing. I literally thanked every volunteer, every police officer and nearly every cheerleader-even if they weren't there for me. Just pretending they were there for me, kept me from disappointing them and eventually myself.

But the most important thing that kept me going was telling myself: pedicure, pedicure, pedicure.

It worked. I ran the whole darn thing, and even skipped a few aid stations-which I like never do. The only thing that could have improved my time was skipping the absurdly long line for water at mile eight and maybe halting the rain?

The ice bath after was painful, but the pedicure made it worth it. That should become a ritual for races.

TODAY'S THE LAST DAY FOR CHALLENGE POINTS!!!
TODAY'S QUESTION: How do you reward yourself after a good run?

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Thanks to everyone for participating!