Commitment and Motivation - 6 weeks to go

6 weeks to go and this week was a toughie. If I didn't have my money already paid I would have been sorely tempted to quit. I was so proud of my 20 miler last Saturday but for some reason it makes the rest of the training seem anti-climatic or needless. It was like, ok, I did the 20 miler, I can do this, I don' t need to keep training. I really struggled to get out on Monday and get going. It was probably the hardest time I have had of getting myself motivated to get out and get going.

So Monday - I waited till 8 pm, as I have been doing to beat the heat, and started out. Unfortunately for me the days are getting shorter and it started getting dark on me before I got home. I ran here in the neighborhood, incorporating the hill I am doing to try and get ready for the marathon, but it was darker than I am comfortable with by the time I got home. Anybody who knows me knows I am a real chicken in the dark but I have been getting up at 5:30 am on Saturdays and starting out in the dark and it doesn't seem to bother me as bad as running in the dark at night. I think I have figured out that it is because in the morning I know light is coming where as at night it's just going to get darker and darker. It was a pretty good run, fair time and I realized I have to start running a little earlier to avoid the dark.

Tuesday was probably the warmest run I have had all year or at least it felt like it. I did 4 miles in the neighborhood and I was really pushing for a good time. I had water with me and I drank as I usually do but I was really warm when I got done. As I was drying off after my shower I had some cramps in my calf, not fun. I have to remember not to push when it is so warm.

Wednesday is the night of the long run but not this week. I had promised Chandler we would go to Bengals training camp this week. They practice just minutes from our house and one of his favorite college players is on the team this year. You might know their last and only evening practice was on Wednesday. I asked Chandler if I could let him and his dad go without me but since I am really more of the sports fan than David Chandler really wanted me to go. I decided that Chandler has been really good to help me get my runs in so I put family first and off we went to camp. It is kind of interesting to set there and watch them practice and see all the players. We stayed till the end and Chandler was able to get a few autographs.

Thursday night was the long run for the week, 8 miles. I stayed in the neighborhood and did ok, Didn't push real hard just ran along till all the miles in. I did decide I am going to start mixing up the routes a little to mix things up.

Friday was rest day. A friend of Cherri's wasn't able to use her ticket to see Beth Moore in Lexington so she gave the ticket to me. I had never heard of Beth Moore but I really enjoyed her speaking. She did a study out of Jeremiah that she called, Eat, Love, Pray. Very powerful speaker. I was amazed that there were 11,000 people from 29 different states.

Saturday morning was the conclusion of Beth Moore's study and then Saturday night was the Midsummer Night's run in Lexington. Both Cherri and I had friends who have only recently started running doing the race and we planned to run/walk with them. As as been the case for several of our runs we had bad weather. As David, Chandler and I headed to Lexington for the race the skies opened up and poured the rain. We pulled into Rupp's parking lot with it raining so hard you could barely see in front of you. Luckily Chandler could pull up a weather map on his phone and we could see that it should pass over pretty quick and it did. Cherri and friend and me and my friend all managed to meet up and even met up with Chris and Bob from the striders. As were lining up for the race I got separated from my friend. I knew she would be fine as she was running with another friend also. Since I was now on my own I decided to go for a good time. I ended up with a 28:37, that is the second time I have ran that, it was my time for the Purity Dash also. I feel like I could have done a little better but the crowd was horrible. Had I realized I was going to run by myself I would have started closer up, as it was at the one mile mark I was still dodging slower runners in front of me. When I finished I met David and Chandler at the finish line and was cheering on the rest of the finishers, fun - fun

My long run on the schedule for Saturday morning was supposed to be 12 miles. Since I needed to be at Rupp at 7:30 am for the conclusion of the Beth Moore study and I wanted to be fresh for the race Saturday I didn't run Saturday morning but planned to do 9 Sunday. I met Cherri and Marty in Midway to do part of the Iron Horse half marathon course. I had driven the course one day with David and I really did not remember how hilly it was. The race is going to start in Midway and go out Stephens St to the East and then back to town and out Stephens street to the West. We headed to the West as it is less hilly. It may be less hilly than going East but it was still a hilly run. We started a little later than we had planned and the hills slowed us down to the point we did 7.5 miles and called it a day.

All in all, considering how at the beginning of the week I didn't think I wanted to keep running it was a pretty good week.

till next week, (another 20 miler next Saturday)
C