Time to get serious

Yeah, I've said that before. I feel like I say this all the time, but I'm going to get more serious about my training. I was disappointed in my performance last weekend. At the end of the race, I didn't feel pride, I felt shame (which is, I realize, melodramatic). And it's not so much that I was comparing myself to my friends - though I was - it's more than I know I can do better.

I finished the race "fast" - meaning I started out too slowly. I've never burned out. I'm getting better at shorter runs where I start out kind of fast and just try to hold on. I'm afraid to do that on a longer race. I don't trust my training - would you? I'm not exactly racking up the miles and tempo workouts and hill training here.

I ran last night with my Camelbak. Five slow miles with the group, and it wasn't bad. I'm going to feel ridiculous doing short runs with it, but I want to get really used to it so I can run with it during races. No walking through water stops!

I have three upcoming races: 5-miler on 4/1, 10-miler on 4/15 and the Cleveland HM on 5/20.

I'm not sure I'll be running the half-marathon for me, so let's not count it (the October half-marathon will be my PR race). But maybe, just maybe, I should make a plan for the Run Cbus 10-Miler. I was just going to wing it and do the race for fun (never done a 10-mile race, so it's an automatic PR), but maybe I should actually TRY. (The group will have a long run the day before, so I'm thinking I'll just do half of the group run.)

The Columbus race is hilly so I need to, you know, do some hills. I would love to do the race in 1:40, although my 10-mile training runs have historically been in the mid-1:50s. The McMillan calculator says 1:41 based on my half-marathon PR and 1:43:55 based on the DC race. Not encouraging, huh?

And I can't say that the calculator is way off because it's close for my 3- and 4-mile races.

In any case, it's time to take things more seriously.

And do some damn strength-training!