Push it real good

Day 87 of 130
Ks covered: 611
Ks to go: 491
General mood: Pretty good
Running highlight: 8K in 41:40
Equipment status: Needs a wash
Body status: Hanging in
Weight: Taking your advice – ignoring it for a while.

Forget “I am woman, I am strong” or “I am an athlete,” that’s lame –  my new running mantra is:

1. Suck it up
2. Live in the moment
3. Think about qualifying for the Worlds

Yes, as my long runs are becoming, well, long, the mental game of marathon training is more in play. And boy, am I ever going mental.

I will admit, I am rather talented at talking myself into stopping when things start to hurt… but speeding up? Surely that’s just Harukiness.

So, in an effort to understand “crazy” I turned to some local running nuts.  Read on for their advice…

1. Suck it up

First I consulted my brother Mark an IronMan who ran a 2:38 fifth place in his first marathon.

Me: “How do you push through when it hurts?”

Mark: “I just push through. There are no real solve-all solutions. Every answer sounds like some magical sports cliche.”

In summary: “Suck it up, Becky.”

Ahhhh, brotherly concern.

2.  Live in the moment

My next guru was Canadian Running editor Michal Kapral. Michal stopped counting his marathons at number 30. He won the Toronto Marathon in 2002 and was the top Canadian in Boston the same year. In 2003 he won the Burlington Marathon and came second in Buffalo. More importantly, he holds the Guinness World Record for the fastest joggling marathon – that’s running while keeping balls in the air.  I thought he meant juggling – before realizing that must mean running with your boobs out.

Enough said. Anyhooooo, here’s Michal’s advice:

“One of the things that sets trained athletes apart from sedentary people is the ability of manage and channel the pain of intense cardio. The more you’ve experienced it in training, the better your ability to get through it in a race. You basically train yourself to know that the pain is only temporary and a good marathon time is forever.

“The best way to handle it for me is to channel the pain into positive energy that drives me forward rather than trying to ignore it or repress it. I use positive self-talk, which is basically acting like a crazy person and telling yourself how fast you are and how well you’re going to do if you just push through it, bit by bit.

“I don’t jump far ahead and think ‘When is this going to end?’ but instead live in the moment, monitoring my effort so I’m running as fast as possible without completely blowing up.

“Former top Canadian marathoner (and now Ontario MPP) Peter Fonseca called this ‘redlining.’ You know from your training what your body is capable of doing, and you just need to push it to the limit – to redline – without going over the top.

The amazing thing is how once you finish a race running as fast as you can, knowing you couldn’t have pushed it any faster, you’ll crave more, despite all of the pain. You get so many days and weeks and years of pleasure from knowing you did your best, and the pain really only lasts about an hour.”

OK Michal, so if I have this right, to get through the race, I have to live in the moment and stay at the limit of tolerance.  But my moment is one of pure pain; a wad of unpleasant laced with unbearable, distilled into an infinite precision of perfect agony…and you want me to live in that? I’d rather move back in with my parents.

Oh, and as for redlining, I’m closer to flatlining, my fleet-footed friend. Of course, I’ve also considered panty-lining; the fine art of preparing one’s undergarments for the eventuality that one will literally run one’s guts out during the race…But I digress.

3. Think about qualifying for Worlds

Finally, I spoke with Reid ‘the everyman’ Coolsaet.   Here’s some insight into his strategy:

“When I got to 35K in my first marathon last year my quads hurt more than they ever have.  I honestly looked down expecting them to look different, as if I could see the pain.  In both of my marathons I always concentrated on something positive to get me to the finish line.  The best thing is to focus on is your time goal, but both marathons I realized my time goal was unachievable by 35K.  Once I realized the time was out the window I had to focus on another goal. Both times I wanted to run under 2:16 and in Ottawa I just kept thinking to qualify for Worlds and run under 2:18.  In Berlin I concentrated and was excited to be the top North American and that kept me thinking positively in the final 3km… and then I got passed by an American in the last 100m, haha.  But it still pushed me to keep the pace honest.

“Sometimes it helps to think in small segments towards the end of a marathon.  Like get to the next water station…  keep it honest until the next bridge, etc.”

Now, don’t get me wrong, my stellar times are a shoe-in for these worlds, but keep it honest? You mean like Bill Clinton honest or Tiger Woods honest? Either way, somebody still got screwed.

Let’s all be honest, marathons just hurt!

I guess the real question is, what would Atwood do? Who am I kidding?  She would push it good.

Let me know what works for you.

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