One of THOSE Runs

Tonight I had one of those runs...

... one of those runs where you feel like you could go on forever.

... one of those runs that make you wish that tonight was your race.

... one of those runs where everything else doesn't exist.

... one of those runs that is unexpectedly great even though you thought you might be really tired, but it turns out you're not.

Sorry to be so philosophical, but a good run will do that to me! The weather was cilly but not too cold, nothing hurt, my heart rate was under control the whole time, perfect!

I even had a good swim today. Today's scheduled workout was for a mile swim. It was actually a good test for me to try a little distance work since "learning" the Total Immersion way. That went really well; it took me about 35 minutes. I can't wait to see what I'll be able to do in 8 more months!

So, I had a dream about the IM last night. It was pretty strange (as dreams tend to be), but I think that it made a few statements about how I feel approaching this thing. The swim (in my dream) was just an out and back. There weren't more than about 20 of us doing the race and at the halfway point, we stopped for some shrimp and cookies. I said it was gonna be strange... hang with me. The second half of the swim was with a current and we just kind of coasted the rest of the way into T1. The swim was WAY easier than I thought it was going to be and I felt great after it (must have been the shrimp and cookies!). When I got into T1, I suddenly realized that I didn't have my running shoes, I hadn't packed any special needs bags, and nothing was quite as it should be. But, the best part was that I never freaked out about it. I decided to head out on the ride and just take things as they came to me. I could run in an old pair of shoes that I happened to have sitting there. Things did not have to work out just as I had planned them for me to have a successful race. It wasn't about not having things exactly where I needed them, it was more about dealing with the problems that were in front of me with the best reasoning that I could muster. And I think that's how I'll need to view the race... there will be things that will be way out of my control, and I will be faced with lots of decisions along the way. What I decide at each step will make or break my day.