Some words about running.
These are my marathon commandments. The divine rules by which I live my running life. These are the things I repeat in my head and remind myself of when I start to veer off-track. These are not set in stone - they will evolve and change over time. These commandments will continue to guide me through my marathon journey, which is destined to be fraught with it’s own set of new challenges, failures, and triumphs.
2016 has been a year of ups and downs for me running wise. I finally conquered the Boston Marathon in April, although it nearly killed me. I ran a couple of awesome trail races on Vancouver Island and in Gatineau Park respectively. I struggled in the heat to a decent finish at the Canada Army Run Half Marathon in September. While I had achieved some good results and checked a few things off my bucket list, I was left with a bit of an empty feeling. A few years back, almost every race was a personal best. It's kind of just how it goes when you start to really get into running. With every race you learn so much, and apply those learnings to training for a next one. You are always getting faster and stronger, and continue to PB...until you eventually hit that wall.
Hot. That seems to be the theme of my races so far this year. After nearly dying in Boston, I thought I was done with heat-filled races for the year. That was until about 9:27 AM on Sunday morning, standing in my corral waiting for the Army Run to start, feeling the hot morning sun start to burn away at my fare skin. "This is going to suck" I said to my buddy Scott who was lined up next to me. "Oh yeah" he responded. We both knew what we were in for.
I don't even know where to begin. This was the hardest blog post I've ever written. I'm usually able to sit down after a race and hammer out my thoughts, but this time is different. I needed time. Time to rest. Time to recover. Time to reflect. Time to clear my mind and get back to normal. This race took a lot out of me, not just physically, but mentally and emotionally. It was hard - the hardest thing I've ever done, and I'm just now wrapping my head around it all.
Well, that time has come. After 20 weeks of training that saw me run over 925km, I am finally Boston Bound. Over the past few weeks I've been tapering, scaling back my effort and fine tuning a few particular things before the big day. I've slowly shifted my eating to ensure that I am both lean and well-fuelled for race day. More calories, clean food, lean proteins and complex carbs - and lots of water. I've continued to work on my speed and, in particular, my target race pace.
It's that time of training again. Tapering. Admittedly one of the weirdest parts of marathon training, I've learn to love tapering over the years. In a nutshell, tapering means that you run fewer kilometres and you rest more. When you've been training you ass off for months through the gruelling winter, running harder and further every week, focussed in on your goal, scaling things back 3 weeks before the race just feels wrong. You're heading for that goal. You can see it. Why am I slowing down now? This makes no sense. The answer? Science. And I don't argue with science.
Marathon training is a lot like a roller coaster ride. There are ups and downs. It's fun and scary. You're both nervous and excited. Sometimes you can see what's coming next, and other times you get pulled in a totally unexpected direction. Sometimes during the ride, you just want it to end. But once it's done, you want to do it again.
