Confidence

Last week I felt aweful running. Just terrible. That's what happens when you push the envelope repeatedly.

Two Saturdays ago I ran in the Garin Park XC race, which my club hosts. The race is a 5k with a fairly flat first and last kilometer, and a roller coaster middle 3k. I have felt great about my hill training as every week I've felt stronger and stronger running on hills - in part to the team hill workouts & in part to living in a hilly section of San Fran. When the race started, I ran the flat part within myself then charged hard up the first hill. About a mile into the race, I'm looking up seeing myself just a few seconds behind some of the best runners in the Bay Area. Well this quickly proved to be a mistake as I felt no recovery between where the first hill finally leveled off and the 2nd steep hill began. Long story short is I spent the second half of the race hanging on for dear life. I dropped from 10th to 13th in the second mile, but held my spot in the last mile, even holding off a challenge from a rival Transports runner. Although I ran a poorly timed race, I walked away happy knowing how tough I had run - especially how bad I wanted to throw in the towel midway. In the finishing chute my teammate's wife was nice enough to laugh as I tried to look forward through my slits of eyelids. Just after the chute when I went to my hands and knees, one of my teammates was nice enough to say "unless you're going to puke get your ass up." You get the idea... I was completely red-lined at the end.

The next day, I started my run slowly, but found myself feeling surprisingly fresh. I ran to where my teammates were meeting, then across the golden gate bridge, through the headlands and back home. All told I ran for 2 hours 15 minutes, which I logged at 19.5 miles (don't ask how I came up with that number). The idea is if I want to have the option of a late year marathon, I'll need that mileage. I spent the rest of the day not wanting to move off the couch.

Well... it was a big weekend, capping off a strong week of training, and my body cried UNCLE! I took Monday off, then it was mile repeats with the team Tuesday (alternating uphill and downhill miles). First downhill in 5:09. Felt flat but no big deal. Then uphill in 5:14.. OUCH that hurt. Then downhill in 4:52. I picked up my stride, but it was downhill, shouldn't be a big deal. Then back uphill in 5:15 and I was falling off the group. My heart rate was through the roof and my head spinning. 2/3 of the way through the workout and I was done. The next day I'm going to run a very easy 8 miles (which has become as routine and brushing my teeth), but 15 minutes into the run my slow jog felt like a race so I turned around and slowly jogged home.

I had a few things going through my head. Back in August, I talked about a more aggressive approach. This meant not making excuses & taking chances with my training. But I also knew pushing through this type of fatigue is a quick way to send your season down the toilet. Then I finally remembered back to my sophomore college XC season. I had returned from summer break in fantastic shape, rebounding from a bumpy freshman year. Half way through the season, my 85 mile weeks caught up with me, and I had a bad race followed by a rough week of training. I was hanging my heading thinking everything I had worked for was slipping away. So my coach pulls me aside before practice one day and says "I see you with a big question mark over your head. I don't have any question about you. I want to see an exclamation point over your head!" I took my tired legs and toughed out that day's workout, and went on to represent our team at NCAA nationals (which was my big goal for the season).

I realized that during any heavy training cycle you'll hit the wall at some point. It's not a big deal. REST. You've earned it.

My fatigue forced me to run easier for the rest of the week heading into the hilly Presidio XC race near my house. This race is 3.5 miles of the hilliest cross country you can imagine. It's up and down and up down, and steep at that. None of the hills are long, but there's 4 main climbs, and every one of them is waiting to eat you up if you take it out too hard. I finally had a race where I positioned myself well, but not too aggressively during the first half. Then over the 2nd half of the race, I pulled away from the runner I was battling with, and nearly reeled in a couple others. I finished 8th, which is my best finish to date in a Pacific Association race, and my time on the course was 1 minute, 22 seconds faster than last year!

I'm confident now. I've trained hard. I've tested the limits. And I've come back even stronger.

Here's a few pics Dana took of my West Valley teammates and I. After the race, we had people over for a fun little BBQ... our first time to host a decent size group in our new apartment.

On Sunday, Dana ran in the San Jose Rock and Roll Half Marathon. She was happy with her training, but worried her recent work travel might affect her. Well, I can't say it did, because she ran an 8 minute PR with her 1:44! The impressive thing is her last 3 miles were the fastest. Nice job!