One Day Until Race Day

What else can I say: the GU was… gooey. It didn’t taste bad (strawberry banana flavor), but I had a hard time with the gooey texture. What texture I was expecting from a product called GU? But it was such a relief to hear from Salty One that I needed to wash the stuff down with a swig of water because I wasn’t quite getting the sense of hydration and energy boost I had imagined. In fact, I felt a little phlegmy, which is something I try to alleviate when I hydrate…

What I wouldn’t do without guidance from my bloggy buddies!

It was a good test to try the GU during my 4.25-mile run during lunch yesterday, which was at the slow and relaxed pace I’ve been targeting in my workouts lately. My knee had to warm up again before it felt comfortable to run, but there were no ill effects this time—no soreness afterward, no next-morning stiffness, no need to elevate, heat and pray.

My mind has been torn over how to rest before a race, and this week has been a good test. It’s not only inability to sit still sometimes that hampers the resting process, but it has more to do with my mind tricks than anything physical. Last month I read a Q&A bit from Runner’s World in which the expert said one’s body loses a bit of its running fitness after three days off. So, I panicked at the beginning of this week about how to spread out my workouts and how much rest was good for me. I’d like to consider myself a wholly rational person, but when it comes to expert advice I’m a blind follower (when I was in sixth grade a doctor told our class that eating certain kinds of lunch meat depleted your memory capacity, I cut out all lunch meat and haven’t touched the stuff ever since). After being sick earlier this month, however, I did discover that my body didn’t exactly wind down to its pre-running shape in the week or so I took off. Plus, it was reassuring to hear from Ryan that fitness comes with recovery.

See: all I need is to hear it from someone and I believe it. Please don’t take advantage of my running naïveté and try to sell me magic shoes. I’m not into easy solutions, but if you tell me they’re good for me, I just might bite.

Tonight, however, I will be familiar territory: the arena of good food. I’m spending the night at my mom’s house (it’s much closer to the race, plus she has Cream of Wheat) and getting some pasta from Beach Club Bistro. I’ve been looking over the course map for the 10-miler and, being just too familiar with the downtown area, I don’t think it looks that far. Sure, it’s 10 miles… but I guess that sense of familiarity puts things in a condensed perspective. Although it was nice in the St. Malachi race to wonder through the Flats’ back roads and find some good modern architecture.

Nevertheless, today will be a day to chill. Chill and hope that the ever-changing forecast for tomorrow will settle on something like “clouds and some sun later in the day” rather than the “rain possible precisely during your race time” that weather.com is showing right now. But, hey, people have conquered greater things than a few rain showers.