Words of Wisdom

Sorry I have not been diligent in my blogging this week. Although there have been some runs that I have done, I have had a busier than usual week at work for a few reasons... 1. I have to catch up with everything after going out of town last week
2. One of our therapist took off some time, so I had to fill in some hours at our other clinic. I also must admit that my previous blog was pretty important, and I wanted that to be the center focus for the week, so I wasn't feeling to rushed to write about running, as I feel as though that situation is a lot more pressing. If you don't know what I'm talking about just click here.
So let's get caught up....
I ran very hard on Tuesday and did intervals. 6 1/2 mile intervals with only a 45 second rest break in between each one. It was tough, but I loved it... very challenging. At the end of my final interval, I was exhausted... but I ran an extra mile home, and I tried to run it at the pace that I plan on running the marathon at. It was challenging, but I was doing this to play a few mental games with myself. I wanted to challenge myself to run at that pace when I was tired. I'm trying to get my body to not want to stop, no matter how tired I am...maybe it will work, maybe not. Great way for me to get 2008 started!!!!

On Thursday, I worked at our South Tampa clinic, and one of the neat things about working down there is Bayshore!!!!! Well, for a runner that is... because it is about the best place to run in the Tampa Bay area, and I'm so blessed to get work down there every once in a while...I will never pass up an opportunity to run on Bayshore.... so many people running and the view is great!!! The other thing is when I run on Bayshore, I always call up my former patient/mentor/coach/friend, Shane Asbury. This guy is the best!!!! He is such a huge reason on why I am doing this race, and he has pretty much given me tons of tips, coaching, training, mentorship and encouragement throughout the past 4-5 months. If he is in town, and I am working in South Tampa, he meets me at the clinic when I'm finished, and we run Bayshore. I knew this would probably be the last time I saw him before the marathon, so I would pick his brain about things I should do to finalize everything and get ready for the big day. So once we got onto Bayshore, we started to run (at a conversational pace) and he was giving me a bunch of tips.... we were supposed to start running harder after 2 miles, but the info he was giving me was so good, that we ended up running easy for another mile before we got into the hard stuff. So this is basically what he told me.
1. Don't get too excited in the beginning... pace yourself properly
2. Write on your forearm 3 goals...make sure one of the goals is to finish, no matter what!!!
3. Don't force something if its not there... If its sweltering heat, don't try to push it... it could get ugly...real ugly
4. Count down the miles after mile 13...he said treat it like New Year's Eve... he said when you count down, you see the end in sight!!!
5. The halfway point is not at mile 13......it's at mile 20. Treat it as a 20 mile warm up and a 10km race... the physically fit people win the first 20, the mentally strong people win the last 10 km.
6. No matter how good or bad it goes, remember the real reasons why you are doing this... fitness, health, personal goals.
7. It's your first marathon...enjoy it!!!

He also brought my goals down a bit... he said I should be ecstatic if I finish in under 4 hours, but don't expect it to definitely happen. He told me about a time, when with 3 miles left he was at 3 hours, and things went so bad over the last 3 miles that he finished 2 hours later. I have to be honest with you... he scared the daylights out of me after I talked with him.... but it has put everything into perspective.... this is no joke!!! I need to respect the marathon distance!!!
But I'm ready to take this on.... Tomorrow morning I will run 8 miles, and then just a few 2-3 mile runs next week and that's it!! Let's do this!!!!!