...And the Agony of Defeat

(It was very tempting to write DaFeet, but I successfully resisted using hackneyed cliche!)

So today I "ran" 14 miles. And the quotes are on purpose, because I'm not happy about it.

I wasn't that worried about today's 14 miles, since I was pretty happy with my 12 mile run two weeks ago, and thrilled with my fantastic 5k on the 4th of July. I had also convinced myself to stop worrying about time on my long runs.

Oh, I so stopped worrying about time. And time stopped worrying about me. Or maybe just stopped ... because I "ran" my 14 miles in ... 3 hours and 48 minutes ... sigh... And David, oh I so hope you are right, that I really am fast, but just don't realize it yet?? I am hanging on to that thought.

At the end, a 50ish, 6-time marathoner asked me if I felt proud of myself, and I said, well, not really ...

When I got home, moaning and bitching about my terrible run, Number One Daughter told me that I am "psycho" about the "whole time thing." She actually said, "You do realize you just ran 14 miles, right?"

Yeah, sorta.

So, to make a long story short, I had to take two bathroom breaks within the first 3 miles ... so once more, our group left us in the dust... Then, Divine convinced me not to stop my watch everytime I stopped running because, as she so cogently noted, when you're running the marathon, your shoe chip doesn't stop just because you have to pee...

So, according to the pace calculator, I ran something like a 17+ minute mile... except, I know I can walk faster than that, for Pete's sake.

After getting off to slow start, and having a 2 min walk every 3 minutes (we changed to a slower pace group with a 3:2 ratio), I dunno, I just sort of lost any drive to even think about pushing myself. So we ran easy. Like really really easy. We stuck to the schedule pretty well right up to the turn around. (Gorgeous Capital Crescent Trail again.) Tons of "Team in Training" folks ran past us, and they were all running together and looked so happy and charged up! I was jealous! Even though Divine and I were laughing ourselves silly during most of our run.

I'd say around mile eight I started getting a little wiggly in my running, signalling brain not functioning so well. So, ate more gu, drank more gatorade. Then knee started hurting. Toes had been banging up against shoe for the entire run (this is a new thing: I wore different socks, and I think they gave my toes less room), so now feet were bothering me. Back started hurting a bit (this is also new, and scary, since I almost had back surgery two years ago and could barely walk for months on end, and I pretty much live in fear of a repeat episode. Yeah, I'm not supposed to run at all..)

So maybe around mile 9 was where I just totally lost my motivation... Ugh, bad feeling. I actually asked Divine to walk thru some runs with me. ... again thinking "time does not matter."

But guess what? Time so totally matters to me!!! I don't care about being fast, but I don't want to be dragging my butt, doing an 8-hour marathon...

I honestly don't know what happened today. I've been going thru the litany all day long: Did I not eat right last week? Did my two fast runs during the week do me in? Did I not sleep enough, not drink enough water? Was it because of the whole watch/don't time yourself thing? Do I need to time myself to motivate myself?

When I run well, I have no idea why, and when I run poorly, ditto. It's so damn frustrating...

I got home with numerous aches and pains, took a cold bath as advised (new torture device), and then took to my bed like a Victorian lady with the vapours.

There was, ladies and gents, no joy in Mudville today. Like the mighty Casey, I just struck out.