Marathon Countdown

     Nine more days until the marathon. I am ready. Ready for this training to be over again. Ready to say, I will never have to run that far again. I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm happy that I trained for it. I pushed myself further than I ever have in my fitness, with thanks to Erika, David, and Emily for pushing me, when I didn't want to. I am sure I will feel incredibly accomplished when I cross that finish line and I will probably never forget that moment. 

     I decided to do the marathon, just because I wanted to push myself more than I was, with my running. I wanted to learn how to actually "train" for something, to learn how to do speed work. I have certainly accomplished that with Kevin's training group and I made some new friends in the process. That can NOT be beat. In early September though, I started to hate running and I questioned what the hell I was doing. I don't have a marathon "story" like most others have. Erika and David have excellent reasons for wanting to complete a marathon. I get it. I didn't have that, and I struggled with why I would want to torture my body and run 26.2 miles when it hurt like hell to do so. Where is the fun in that? 

     Last weekend we completed 20.5 miles of mostly hills. We ran the hilly part of the marathon course one and a half times. In the rain. In the cold. For 3 hours and 45 minutes. We were chilled to the bone when we were done and I know that at least Erika and I required a nap later that afternoon. That was my decision making day, to marathon or not. Well of course I can't let Erika and David down, so I will be standing at the start line on October 16th to run 26.2 miles with two pretty awesome people. 

     I will be happy to have my running back after the race. To run just for the hell of it with no training plan in sight. I will stick in a weekly speed session because I (mostly) loved those. I will maintain a weekend long run, because I did learn that I am in love with the half-marathon distance and I will be taking on many more of those races. I did learn a lot from training with Kevin and I'm happy with where I am with my running. The best thing I did was sign up for his running group. I learned a lot about myself and running and I gained some pretty good friends.