29/52 - Ten Things About Race Training

[emelbe]

1. I love running, when I remember that I love running. I don't always remember. In fact, I frequently forget and what I have to do to get myself out the door rivals the drill instructor barking I used to have to use to get my daughter out of bed for school in the morning. And then it takes a block or two to shake the rust off my ankles and a mile or two to actually get the blood flowing and for my strides to feel right and my breathing to settle down but come mile three it's perfect and I can't believe it was so hard to get going.

2. Running is one of my favorite ways to see a city. Any city. Including my own. The image above could be filed under: reasons to always take my phone running. On Saturday, I saw buffalo while out on my long run. I didn't take a picture this time but I could've.

3. I lost my first toenail as a distance runner last year. Took me long enough. This year, I've lost three so far. It doesn't hurt but it's always a little odd. This time I didn't even realize until my pedicurist (a treat I do for myself, with all the other terrible things I do to my feet) pointed out that two of them were so far gone that they were being pushed off by the new nails growing underneath.

4. I am not terribly fast. If you want to be snooty about it, I'm a jogger, not a runner. I'm faster than I used to be, by quite a bit but I'm still the tortoise, never the hare. I will never win a race. Probably not even when you break it down by age. But that's okay. I'm only ever racing myself, sometimes not even that.

5. Training here definitely has its quirks. I've written about the wind here before. I know it's the wind tunnels created by the skyscrapers and the hills but there are times when I feel like I can go for miles, turning in all cardinal directions, and always, always be running into the wind. It is exhausting and exhilarating.

6. This year will be my fourth year running the same half marathon. It is gorgeous and I can't imagine not running it year after year. It's not a fast race. It's hilly, a designation I find hilarious given that I live and train in San Francisco but sure: hilly.
In 2010, my first year running this half, I ran just to finish and did. In 2011, I broke a bone in my foot two months before the race. I was cleared to run again a week before the race and opted to run it anyway, despite not having trained at all. I finished seven minutes slower than in 2010. In 2012, four months after injuring myself in the SF Marathon, I trained for a PR. I finished seven minutes faster than I did in 2010, fourteen minutes faster than in 2011.

7. Training for the San Francisco Marathon last year, I got a decorative garden stone stuck in the heel cup of my shoe and managed to damage my right knee as a result. It happened during my longest training run and I was just supposed to taper after that so I took the last few weeks off almost completely to try to heal up. It did. Sort of. It went out again at mile eleven. I finished but ended up having to take weeks off to recover. I still get twinges.

8. This particular race, being in mid-November, means my last few weeks of training runs are either during lunch hours or in the dark because of the time change. Running in the dark on paths shared by bicyclists commuting home is a little terrifying, even with lights attached to me. As is running on not-entirely stable paths in the dark.

9. Earlier this year I severely pulled a hamstring and tweaked a ligament in my left knee. I think my knees now roshambo for which one is going to hurt on any given day but as long as I keep the lateral movement to a minimum and avoid taking any more kicks to the knee, I'm mostly okay.

10. This year I had intended to try for another PR--to shave off another seven minutes and finish in under two hours--but between the injuries and other cross training my heart hasn't been in it. I haven't stuck to my schedule like I have years prior. I've only really been running a day or two a week, a long day and a short, fast day. (Plus TRX, plus swimming, plus weighted rucking, plus my self defense practice, plus, plus, plus.) It doesn't feel like enough but there are still days that I lace up the shoes and it feels like flying: fast (for me) and strong and just good to be out there. It makes me I wonder if maybe this sort of loose, informal training is a good balance for me. I suppose I'll find out in a few weeks.