Two a days

It's actually a football practice term, meaning that you practice twice a day. I use it to describe when I run more than once in a day, splitting miles up due to time restraints. If I had my way, I wouldn't have to do it this way. I much prefer a 10 mile run straight, rather than 2 5's or something like that. Some people call them doubles, or split runs, whatever. But actually today I use that term in the title because I have 2 things to cover today. I should save one for tomorrow, lol, but I know that I have the 22 mile run tomorrow to talk about for sure. One came to me during my run, the other while I was having a phone conversation with a fellow runner.

While out on my 13.1 mile run yesterday, my body was sore. Lots of miles, lots of training right now. This and next week are the biggest mile weeks of this training session, and for as well as I'm running, I'm just a little beat up right now. In my mypace blog I wrote about how last Sunday when i did my 20 miler, that 6 months ago, if I had felt like I did before that run, I probably would have taken at least 2 or 3 days off. Now I don't even think about skipping a run, let alone a day. The days preceeding yesterdays run were 15 on Wed, and 10 on Thur, both of them having some intense parts of the workout, not just out eating up miles. Anyways, I flashed back to a run, one that I did about 13 months ago. I used to be off on Sundays and Tuesdays. And as a less experienced runner, having only 1 day in between to recover from my longer run on Sunday, would make it hard. Now remember, my longer run on Sunday then was usually 6 of 7 miles. So I was thinking about this Tuesday run. The Sunday right before it, I had broken the double digit mark for miles for the first time ever. I did 10 that Sunday, so I wanted to follow it up with another 10 on Tuesday. Worst run of my life I think, man it was bad. I remembered walking, cramping, just doing everything I could to get finished. I was trying to get ready for my first half marathon then, and thought for sure I was never going to make it, that I would never finish. Now double digit days are the norm. It just made me smile a little bit. If you read this and think about how you may be doing lower miles, it wasn't that long ago that I was too. Stay with it.

Second thought...running has made me a rock star. Far greater than I could have imagined. And far more than what I deserve for my ability level. But day in and out, it's what drives me, my life, hell even my love life here lately, all of it based around running. There is another person who posts on Runners World that I am friends with. He is a better runner than I am. Some people like him, others don't because he's opinionated, pulls no punches, speaks his mind. I have a lot of respect for him, but actually very little of that has to do with running, don't get me wrong, I would love to be able to run like him, but I'm talking more about the other things in his life. His S/O, family stuff, and work are all very importaint to him. When I hit the big time, I rode the wave of popularity, I'm still riding it. To the demise of a lot of other things. My marrige, my job, friendships, relationships. I've damaged or ended everything in that list. And it's all fleeting, here today, gone tomorrow. The Entertainer by Billy Joel, check it out. Is the difference that he was always a runner and I am just becoming one? Or is it more about the kind of person I am? I guess here the last few days, I have been wondering who I'm running for? Am I running for myself, or for the accolades of people that with the exception of one or two of them, I could give a fuck less what they think. I don't mean to be harsh, but on race day when I line up, I look around and want to whip ass on everyone who is around. Just people I want to finish behind me. So the question is...Springsteen or Axle Rose...Is it really better to burn out, then fade away?

So I did 10 miles today. I thought it was only supposed to be 5, but did all 10 and with a 22 on the schedule for tomorrow, it'll make 5 days in a row of double digit miles. 15, 10, 13.1, 10, and 22. That's 70.10 miles in 5 days. Tomorrow makes my May 4th marathon in my opinion. My strength and resolve will be as closely tested tomorrow as it will be in May. We'll see tomorrow.

Goodnight all :-) May your evening be as good as mine.