Chocolate!
Just kidding, it's running. No duh, right? We're less than 3 weeks out from running the Ragnar Relay, a 200+ mile relay race with 12 people in 2 vans. There's over 400 teams in our race alone, so it's kind of a big thing. I somehow became the captain, and now am slowly losing all my sanity. Do you know how much organization it takes to coordinate 12 people to run 200+ miles, 200 miles away from home? Ok, it's actually closer to 300 miles away.
There's hotel rooms to book, vans to rent, run legs to assign, food to buy now, food to buy then, safety equipment that every runner has to have (every runner!!), van decorations (oh yea, we should think about that). Plus all the rules to follow, like what happens if we have an injured runner. Please God don't let us have an injured runner!
In the midst of all this, I still have to train, too. My run legs are 8.2 miles, 3.8 miles, and 5.3 miles. I anticipate to be running around 4:00 in the afternoon, 3:30 in the morning, and then again at 12:15 the next afternoon. Yes, you read that right: 3:30 in the morning. I am not too excited about that, but at least it's my shortest and easiest run.
Also, I know this because I have a very, very detailed spreadsheet to keep track of this all. Organization is my middle name.
Ragnar Relay is craziness. For real. But I'm so excited! Nervous too, but mostly excited. August 15th cannot get here fast enough!
So how am I prepping to run this? By simulating the runs at home, of course. I'm not really running the same mileage, but I did read that the best way to train is to get used to running on tired legs. Which means running twice a day, or every 12 hours. Not all week long, of course, just once a week to prep.
I've started running my normal 5 miles on Thursday morning, a quick 2-3 miles on Thursday afternoon, and then 3 miles again on Friday morning. It's really not so bad. I'm slowly increasing the mileage in that second run, but it feels ok. I'm definitely tired come Friday, and I want to eat everything in sight. But that's maybe not so different from a normal day.
I still do my long runs on Sundays to keep up the long miles. This past Sunday I woke up to rain and wind: not my ideal running weather. If it were a race or something that I had to run in, then I'd tough it out. But for a training run? Bump that! I settled in with a nice long movie and ran on my treadmill for 1:20:00. I run slower on my treadmill, but I figure that time is about what 9 miles takes me. I'm good with that. Running on the treadmill always feels like cheating, but it's better than not running at all.
Hopefully I will be ready to rock it out in a few weeks here. Fingers crossed that all of our runners are healthy and no one drops last minute. I'm praying for our overall safety and health until then, and during the run. Team D'range'd Dozen is going to kick some asphalt!
What's on your mind lately?
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