Monday, March 3, 2014

Getting Excited about Indian-Celina Challenge

  First off, my run this morning didn't happen.... snow and ice and single digits with winds around 15 mph - I am literally zapped and done with it, tomorrow will only be slightly better with no wind but then it looks too good to be true but the 10 day forecast shows that starting Wednesday, Winter might just finally loosen her grip on us here........ and possibly let Spring come in - temps will start being in the 40's to 50's for the next ten days starting Wednesday. I am hoping, I am praying with all the energy I have left that the single digit weather is finally freaking over. I might run my 6 miles this afternoon if my mom watches Dorian, but only if she can get out of her driveway. Temps won't be any better but the wind will have died down.
   Second off, last night I was talking to DH about the two small races I have this month, these being the last small races I will ever sign up for most likely. I told him didn't really want to do them - a 5k this Saturday and a 7k next Saturday, I just feel like they are in my way of adapting and getting my body more comfortable with 15+ miles, I mean I wasn't sore yesterday which was surprising and the soreness from the 15 miler Saturday was actually dying down by Saturday evening but I still feel and want to be running 15 milers as much as possible this month and next month. If I do these races, I'll race them and most likely won't want to get in a long run afterwards, I could get in a 8-10 mile long run before the races but I don't know. I love these longer runs, and I don't regret signing up for these smaller races as my money helps them and that is the most important thing. Ugh, I guess it will all depend on how successful my runs are this week, if I can get my 6 miler in tonight or tomorrow night, then my 8 miler in Wednesday morning and then the other 6 miler either Thursday or Friday morning. I won't make my decision now, I'll wait until Friday morning to decide on whether I run the race or not.

   And now for the real excitement, these past couple of weeks I've been reading race reports on the Land Between the Lakes' 26.2, 60k and 50 Miler race and race reports on the Ozark Trail 100. I love reading race reports, especially ones about ultra events (a person goes through so much, so much more and so much longer in ultras, the RR's are so much longer), and I really like reading RR's about races I am interested in - gives me an idea of what I can expect.
    Well last night, the idea hit me to look up race reports for the Indian-Celina Challenge, I am registered for the half marathon this June and the elevation gain of around 2,900 - 3,100 feet is a  bit daunting I must admit so I began looking for race reports to get an idea on just how tough this race is. The pictures and reports have me really excited, I haven't been on that trail in like.... 3 or 4 years and I only probably went in 2 miles before turning around, I was just hiking then and taking photos and the thought never crossed my mind that people ran those trails. I want to badly to hit those trails now, just out of curiosity, but my concern right now is whether they are super nasty and muddy so it doesn't look like a run there will happen this month - I am an hour away from there and my time is very precious, it would be downright upsetting if I drove a full hour to get there only to find the trails just awful and to drive back after attempting to run on them. I guess my reason for not going there yet is because I don't like the idea of being away from my son for almost 6 hours (the drive there - 1 hour - the run - 2-3 hours - the drive back - 1 hour / 4-5 hours away from him).
    But I want so badly to know what I am in for, and I will only feel ready if I hit those trails... so depending on the weather in April or later this month I might just head up there on a Sunday morning and attempt those trails. Anyways, I am really excited about this race as I have mentioned so many times already - if I didn't already have my heart set on Indy as my first marathon AND if I wasn't nervous about the elevation gain I'd probably attempt the 26.2 distance instead of the 13.1 distance.

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