Nuggets of wisdom from today's longass run

Today I did my longest ever training run. To simulate the mental beatdown that 100 miles might be, I made it a 3 loop course. To simulate as much as possible the terrain that I might find at Vermont, I made that course include Turkey Creek at Umstead. Here are today's lessons learned/weirdo epiphanies:

• If you're going to be running 42 miles, and some sizeable chunk of it solo, it would be best to expose yourself to a variety of musical options in the week preceding the run.  While I do like Gotye's "Somebody That I Used To Know," 28 or so miles of the chorus was a bit much.



Now you, too, can sing this for 42 miles!











...or this may have a more lasting effect

• Fresh socks make you feel like a new person.  For a while, anyway.

• I thought I was really clever when I came up with the idea that I was doing a triathlon, complete with transition zones, except all the events were 'run'.  I'm still mildly amused by it (enough to include it here), but it is not 'really clever'.



• The promise of cantaloupe is very motivational.





doesn't this make you want to take on the world??



• I forgot to put body glide somewhere.  Much sadness.




• Vespa is still awesome.




• Shannon is also awesome.

yaaay!!!!

I'm sure there were other things, but I have probably blocked them out with the memory of the pain (okay - it wasn't really that bad, but I think repeated loops caused me to save over some memories from previous loops).

Thanks for indulging this silliness!

Saturday's plan (because I didn't want to post a novel on facebook)

We (possibly the royal 'we') will be starting around 7:30 at the I-40 overpass between the Black Creek Greenway and Umstead Park on Old Reedy Creek Rd.  We will be running THREE (count them) laps around the park, essentially mimicking the Umstead 100 course (Reedy Creek -> Turkey Creek ->Graylyn->Reedy Creek).

• The theme of the first lap (starting at 7:30) will be "no miles under 10 min - you still have two more laps to go"



• The second lap will start around 10.  The theme of the second lap will be "hooray!  Shannon is here!"



• The third lap will ideally start around 12:30 (no promises, though). The theme of the third lap will be "ohmyfrickinggod this sucks - just try to keep moving forward"  I also may not be great company at this point.

Each lap will be 14 miles, and I will be going back out to my car each time, so if you want to join me or just point and laugh, be at the appointed location at one of those times.

If you want to break into my car, come other than one of those times, but be aware that your options for thievery will be as follows:

• 5-10 year old camp chairs 
• a yoga mat
• a first aid kit
• a roadside assistance kit
• maybe some pb&j sammiches
• perhaps some nasty running shoes
• things that are original parts of my 13-year-old car (with the exception of the battery, which I think is only about 7 years old)

For the folks who are more running-oriented, though, I'd love to see you, but I'm also totally fine to slog through it alone, as I'm sure there will be many solo miles in Vermont :)

Training for a 100

As some/many (okay, let's be honest - only 3 people actually read this) already know, in a fit of Turkey-induced delirium, I signed up for the Vermont 100 last Thanksgiving.  SO I thought it might be fun to share a little of what I've learned over the past few months (and going forward into the actual race).  Today's topic will be funny things I've thought/said/noticed in the past few months.  I'm trying not to make this sound narcissistic, but I think I may have failed in a couple of spots.  Apologies if I come off as narcissistic.  Anyway, back to the topic at hand:

• I now run at "Party Rock" pace (every day I'm shufflin')
• Some days it's just mentally easier to tack 14 miles onto an already completed run than to face 30 the next day.
• I've started taking the most boring route possible on training runs as a mental beatdown training
• I can rationalize sleeping in and running later as "heat training"
• Sometimes you have to cut a run short.  I had to do this yesterday because apparently my body did not want to run 35 miles whilst battling a cold.  So I disappointedly cut my run to 24 miles.  

I just really hope that I am able to regain a sense of what is normal and what is not after this whole adventure is over.