Today and yesterday were relatively boring days. I worked a lot. But I also had two runs scheduled for the two days. Here's what I have to say about them.
My theme this week has been not setting limits for myself. Pushing beyond what I think is possible to accomplish. I've been "running" since high school.1, 2, 3 miles at a time. I ran in high school for wrestling, in college for frisbee, and just to stay in shape. Now I'm running to train for a half marathon. Things are scheduled now, and I'm running further and further. The farthest I've ever gone is 8 miles, but I walked some of it because I thought I was too tired to keep going.
This week we did 6 miles. There were very few moments where I felt like giving up. I ran through my walls and just continually told myself that any negative thoughts were bullshit (a la Dhani Jones). I also continually told myself that I was having fun, regardless of if it was true or not. Believe it or not, these tactics work when you're really suffering.
Yesterday was a 4 mile run. I was still a little sore in the hip from our 6 miler. But, it was just a little pull and it didn't hurt too much before we went out, so I figured, whatever, just do it. I honestly didn't even notice the pain again until after my shower. The four miles were miserable the entire time. It was one of those days when you just go into survival mode. Push and get through it. I mentally broke the run up into about a million pieces. It's easier when you can check things off of a list and see the number decreasing.
We averaged 9:47 per mile. That's not so great. It's also a few seconds slower than our 6 mile run pace. Ugh. It was overall just a bad day for me.
I did not have high expectations for this morning. I knew it was only 3 miles, so I figured, whatever, I can just get through this and things will be fine. Until my wife says she wants to do a tempo run.
I don't give in to challenges if I honestly believe I can achieve it. I thought I was struggle on a normal paced run, but trying to run a tempo of a 9:15 mile (which was our goal) may have been out of my realm of possibilities for today. But hey, what's the worst that happens? I get tired and have to slow down.
We started running from just inside our parking lot. Turn down our street and as we get to the bottom (about a quarter mile) I feel like there is absolutely no way this is going to happen today. But I made it a point to try to keep up with my wife. At 1 mile, we had done about an 8:45 minute mile. Oh crap. We're pushing too hard. I'm gonna be toast. Our second mile was a little over 9 minutes. Oh boy. Still pushing hard, but at least that mile was at the pace we originally wanted to set.
As we start pulling into the last half mile, my wife says she's gonna push up the last little hill. She actually told me "I hate this hill so I'm gonna kill it!" Fair enough. I hate it too. But I'm dying here.
In my own head, I said, "Try to keep up, but if you can't, try to make it up after you crest the hill." She gained a few seconds on me, and I tried to pull her back in the last flat section, but I'm not sure I made up much ground, if any. Right before she broke away, she told me that on tempo runs, you shouldn't have a kick at the end. I tried to not have a kick. I may have even slowed down at the end, I'm not sure, but I definitely didn't kick.
I cross our last cross-street and look at the watch and push as hard as I can until the watch turns over to "3.0" in the "miles" section. I click stop on the timer. I'm looking very intently at the watch, but it took me a minute to figure out what our time was because my eyes were watery and I was trying to catch my breath.
Turns out, I ended at 27:35. My wife beat me by 10 seconds. Either way, we ran an 8:51 mile average. Holy hell. I've done 8 minute miles before, but only running one mile. I also did that when I was significantly closer to 200 pounds. We're talking like... 210. Not 250.
These runs just proved to me even more that I absolutely cannot set limits for myself. I need to ignore what I think is impossible to do physically and just do it. Because more often than not, I can.
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