Autopilot

At 5:30am this morning, 15 minutes before my alarm was set to ring, my eyes fluttered open and a sense of dread settled over me. Usually at this pre-dawn hour, I smile at the fact that I have a couple of hours of sleep left before the kids awaken and the craziness ensues. Not this morning. It was race day. And, I wasn't feeling it. I actually considered staying in bed, leaving my shoes, running clothes, timing chip and bib on the floor where they sat waiting on me. But something pulled me out of bed. Routine? Maturity? A competitive nature?

Our babysitter arrived at 6:20am. Our ride pulled in the driveway at 6:30am. Seat belt fastened, car in reverse, we were on our way. Was I really doing this? My bed felt miles away, and I knew I had miles ahead of me. 6.55 to be exact. I raced a quarter marathon today, a new distance for me. There was also a half marathon race being run concurrently, in which Brad was racing. We arrived in downtown Louisville in the dark, and I decided that this race was just going to be a training run. My "real" race is December 3rd in Memphis when I run the St. Jude half marathon. I determined that I really had no vested interest in today's race so I was just going to have fun. Then, I opened my car door and 34 degrees of no-fun-at-all cold air slapped me in my face. I wanted my bed because these conditions were pure misery.

Brad and I ran a 1.25 mile warm-up, which was freezing. I couldn't feel my face or hands by the end of it. Wonderful. I made my third stop at the port-a-potty to pee and lined up at the start line. 7:45am, the official start time, came and went. I just wanted to get the race started so I could get it over with. Usually I'm a ball of nerves at the start line. Not today. I didn't feel anything. I just didn't care, which was weird, and I didn't know what to do with that feeling of nonchalance.

Finally, we were off. The first mile was okay. I finished it in 8:00 min. I was passed by a lot of runners, but that's typical because I usually start close to the start line so I don't get behind a bunch of slow runners or walkers. The second mile was a few seconds slower, but I was cruising. The 1:50 half marathon pace group was right in front of me, so I settled in with this group. They were like a lifeline, tethering me to the course and pulling me along. My legs were turning over but my mind was not engaged. Mile 3 was at about a 8:19 pace. Still okay for my goal finish time of 54:30.

The quarter marathon and the half marathon split at mile 4. That's when things fell apart. When I turned left on the course, away from the halfers, I found myself running completely BY MYSELF down the middle of a wide street with no spectators. I lost all motivation and desire to keep running. Never have I wanted to quit so badly but somehow my legs kept going. I slowed down, though. Mile 4 was 8:37, mile 5 8:38. And, lots of f-bombs starting falling in my head. My internal dialog went something like this: "Why the fuck am I doing this? I'm never fucking running again. I fucking hate running. I'm fucking crazy! It's fucking cold, and I fucking want to quit."

I checked my Garmin and at mile 5.25 I decided to speed up just to end the misery. And, all of a sudden out of nowhere, I hit my stride. I was rolling and was finally mentally engaged! The end was in sight when I looked at my watch and realized two things 1) the course was going to be long and 2) I wasn't going to make my time goal but only because the course was long. I couldn't believe that the race was going to end well despite the mental agony throughout.

Remember those fellow students who would say, "I didn't even open a book for this test?" and then they'd score a 105 with extra credit? I always hated those people! Well, in a running sense, that was me today. I completely pulled a great run out of my ass. I ended up winning my age group, finishing before 32 other women in the 35-39 division. I finished 9th female out of 263 and 36th overall out of 372 runners in the quarter marathon. WTF? The prize was a full-size Louisville Slugger bat with the race details engraved on the barrel.

Accolades aside, the best part of the day for me was being able to run half of a half marathon at a pace 10 seconds faster than the pace I want to run on December 3rd. And, I have five more weeks of training to get where I want to be. I just hope I'm more willing to get out of bed that day. Today really showed me that half the battle is in your head, so maybe in addition to running more miles, I need to work on my race day internal dialog.