am) 6 miles. I met up with Benji Durden this morning and went for a nice jog. It's always cool to run with someone like Benji.. pretty much a legend. Although I think he would laugh at that! It was fun and good to hear his thoughts. Hopefully it will become a weekly thing.
I just walked back in my door after starting a 13 mile run. I made it a few hundred feet down my trail and stopped.. turned and walked back. I had every intention of running 140 miles this week and I feel quite good. Something stuck in my head from my run with Benji this morning that I couldn't shake. I said I was going to run 140 miles this week and then taper next week. He commented that he always tapered for just 2 weeks.... be he was only running 90 miles. Hmmmm. He was only running 90 miles... and 2:09 marathons.
I see what I NEED to be doing right now which is getting rested and focusing solely on key workouts. This is why I stopped my run this evening. What I WANT to do is run 20 miles a day. Need VS want.
Along with this WANT to train hard comes the WANT (ok, I'll stop shouting) to run well in Austin 23 days from now. I look back at all of my years of racing Ironman on tired legs and I truly do regret it.. I can't do that with the marathon. Although I feel I could get 140 miles this week is it really going to help me at Austin? No. I plan on racing a 4 mile cross country race this Saturday and then running a very specific long run on Sunday (I have a course that mimics Austin's very closely) and I want those 2 days to be good. There should be some bad-asses at the XC race which I'm excited to watch, albeit from the back.
My obsessive compulsion to push myself needs to be tempered right now.. pent up, stuffed deep down in my gut.. then let out on Feb 17th..
5 comments:
Benji's the real deal. I have never had the guts to ask if he ever gets annoyed as the guy who gets introduced as one of the marathoners that did not get to go in 1980. When you read "again to carthage" you actually get a chapter where Quenton runs with him in the trials. Awesome to his bounce back from cancer a few years ago.
And - he still gets results up faster than anyone I know - even without that chip crap.
Lucho
It is a greater power to control ones self than it is to keep to the rail. I have been reading your blog for a while now and see in you an evolving, profound athlete that is testing....as well as...learning... his limitations.
Keep up the good work....
I have been reading your blog for quite sometime and this is the first time I know I can relate. Last year when I was getting ready (the week before) for Xterra Worlds I was forced to rest a lot and keep all my workouts indoors due to all the fires in San Diego. Everything was short and focused. I ended up having the race of my life and am now a firm beliver in "rest"... that's all.. looking forward to reading some more...
Great point in this blog. Seeing the forest for the trees as it were... Here's to your "unstuffed" race to come.
Ditto to all of the above Lucho. Sometimes as athletes we tend to allow our fears to get the better of us and added mileage or volume helps to squash them. But it's like the old adage of treating the symptoms and not the cause. Trust in your training to this point; we all know the hay is in the barn. We've seen it by reading your blog for the last few months. Re-read it if you must.
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