Day 49 (Thurs - 2/18)

Today was the first day of our staycation and what a day it was. We ordered the desk from an online retailer. Same model as the one at the local furniture shop, just $400.00 less. It means that we will have to arrange to unload it from a freight truck, but in order to save $400.00 I am willing to do some lifting, and thankfully my dad is also.

I got out for a run after the kiddo whet down for a nap. I wanted it to be a slow and long and wanted it to be really long. I ended up doing 8.8 miles in 1:20:52 (9:10 miles) which is another “longest run ever” and it felt great. The trail was really muddy and there were snow dirfts to maneuver around every 10 feet on the back section. It felt like fun.

I can now say with little doubt that my aerobic pace is between 9:00 and 9:10 depending on the day and conditions. I am feeling really good about that it is below the 10:00 mark that I though it was and that I now have a base line to improve. The goal is to get this to 8:20. I hit the “growth” section of the run at around the 7.4 mile mark (this was back at the 5 mile mark in January). I am beginning to believe that a 13.1 mile run is not as daunting as it seemed on day one.

If I keep the growth up I will hit my first 13+ mile run sometime in April. In past years this is when I started my training for the season. I feel so much more prepared. I think there are a few keys that have been critical so far and I plan to continue dialing them in:
- Support network
- Nutrition and recovery
- Training methods and form

I read a really interesting article about visualization training. Apparently there is a good deal of research regarding how your body responds to stimulus from a subconscious level and that by using visualization training you can begin to adjust what your subconscious considers to be “normal”. For example, if you have always visualized yourself as a sprinter and not a distance runner (as I have). Then your body responds differently when faced with a 3 mile run than if you have always visualized yourself as a distance runner. Your subconscious responded differently depending on your perception of yourself. Now there is plenty of physical training that is required also, but it is important to no neglect the effort that is needed in reframing your subconscious as your training takes effect. The more relaxed athlete typically has the better performance and that edge might just come from the subconscious.

I am starting to visualize that 70.3 clock as I cross the finish line “5:43:20”.