25% There!

After today's long run, I have completed 25% of the 16 weeks of training. Of course, this is just the "official" marathon training. I haven't counted how many weeks since I actually started walking and then woggling and then jogging, so it's actually much more than 25%, but I have COMPLETED 25% of the OFFICIAL marathon training. It's really hard to believe.

It's hard to think about how much I've already accomplished and how much better physically I'm feeling. I'm also feeling more positive about the runs and my ability to complete them. Sometimes (just sometimes), I feel as if I could run forever. It just feels SOOO good to be out there training. The runs are hard, but I feel like the queen of the earth when I finish them.

It feels so good to be physically feeling what I wrote about here in relation to achievement and motivation. Achievement is behavior in action, increasing motivation is the cognitive consequence, which in turn inspires more behavior.

And I've felt this progression every week. My long run (achievement) makes me feel so amazing and proud and that feeling caries me through (motivates me for) my Tuesday and Wednesday runs and then my Tuesday and especially Wednesday (because it is longer) runs carry me through my Friday run and then before I know it, it's time for another long run.

This week I was, again, very nervous for my long run. I think it is because I've been obsessive up until this point about going to bed SUPER early on Saturday night (like 8:30pm) so that I'm ready to go on Sunday morning. This week I wasn't able to do that, and so I was worried that it would really affect my run. I woke up and was instantly hit by a wall of anxiety about the run. I overcame this by thinking about the fact that I felt rested and that HONESTLY, once I started running, I knew that I wasn't going to stop. Once I'd started, I was going to move my body for more than two hours, and once I reached 8 miles I'd stop. The run wasn't hard . . . . the start was.

On my run today, I was thinking about something interesting regarding distance. Initially, I considered every run long. It was hard to get going because of how far the miles seemed. Five, seven and eight are BIG numbers when you are talking miles (or at least I still think so)! I was intimidated by the distance, but as the mileage increases on the Sunday runs, only those distances not yet run continue to feel "far." Any mileage that I've already accomplished and surpassed, no longer qualifies.

Now, only the first couple of miles (especially on Sunday) seem long, tough, a real effort; once I'm by those it's like I get into a grove and start to relax. I think about other things, or I focus on my feet, my breathing, my arms moving, the act of running . . . anything except the number of miles. And the miles just slip away under my feet. It's like I'm not even aware of them.

Often, it isn't until I near the end of the run that I find myself thinking in terms of distance, and then it is to report to myself how much is left. But instead of saying, "I've still got a mile to go," I find myself thinking, "Only one to go." Only, there was a time when I couldn't have imagined doing one mile; now, I'm saying, "ONLY one mile." It's shocking to hear yourself define as "only" what you used to think would kill you, but once you've gone further than that it impacts how everything else is interpreted. Pretty cool.

Physically, my hip muscles were better today. They've been aching on the long runs. However, the last two weeks I felt like I finished the long runs STRONG. Today, I really struggled the last mile, and my legs were very tight, preventing me from finishing as fast as I would have liked.

I tried eating a little more breakfast before I left the house today. I had a piece of whole wheat toast with fresh peanut butter and half a banana sliced on top. Honestly, the only difference I noticed with eating was that I didn't get ravenous quite as fast once I was finished running. It's hard to say if it affected my running other than that.

I was super happy with my mileage this week. The Wednesday 5-miler really took it out of me, and I struggled through my day at work. I COULD move my "medium" run to Thursday because it's my day off, and I wouldn't have to be as functional for the rest of the day but part of me really feels like I need that extra day to rest up for the next long run. I think I'll see how it goes this week with doing my 5 miler on Wednesday and then go from there.

This week- 20 TOTAL miles!

Next week-Double digits on the long run (10 miles)!

Wish me luck!