Look what I can do!

Last night, as I was preparing for bed, I said something to myself over and over again. I said, "Tomorrow, I am going to run five miles." I remember saying it to myself several times as I fantasized about being General U.S. Grant receiving President Lincoln as a guest in my tent in one of his many visits to the front line. Some people worry about bills and children in the dark quiet before sleep takes them away, and they take pills to hurry the Sandman along. Me, for about 20 minutes I fantasize that I am a character in a book I am reading, or that I am in Star Wars, or that I am some swashbuckling romantic hero. And I sleep pretty well. I digress.

My point is that my last thoughts were the affirmation that I was going to run five miles today.

This morning, I awoke knowing that I would run five miles today. Now, I belong to a running group that is preparing for various spring marathons, mini-marathons, and other long races. I am just along for the support. They run on Saturdays, and I awoke today to see whether the weatherman had been a huge liar. He had not. It was well below 20°, and I cannot bring myself to running in that sort of weather, even though the team leader promised to bring muffins. Since the weather was not favorable, I retooled my thinking so that I affirmed to myself that I was going to run five miles on a treadmill at the YMCA. This is a much more daunting prospect because of the whole boredom factor. Still, I affirmed.

All during the day, as I prepared breakfast for Little One, as I read the newspaper, as I drank my water, I affirmed that later on I would run five miles.

Time passed and the time came to go to the YMCA, and as I mounted the treadmill, I contemplated the settings I would enter into the treadmill so that I could run five miles. Turns out that the YMCA sets their treadmills so that you cannot configure them to run more than one hour. So there was my pace. I had to run better than a 12 minute pace.

And then I ran five miles. I ran it in 56 minutes and three seconds feeling like I could have kept running. I have not run that far since college, better than 15 years ago. I don't have anybody to brag to about this, so you are stuck reading about it, Dear Reader.

So, to sum up, the following things worked extremely well for me.

1. Affirmations. I need all the positive self talk I can muster, even the night before. Especially the night before a long run.

2. Hydration. I drank at least 40 ounces of water by mid-afternoon when I ran.

3. Cross-training. I cycled one day this week, and last night I did some leg and core strengthening calisthenics. And a little yoga.

All in all, I am very pleased with myself. I'm so pleased, in fact, that I am going to go buy a big, fat bottle of wine and undo everything I accomplished today.

Tags: jogging, running, issues, workouts