June 17, 2006
Ran another race today. This one was for the Women’s Fitness Festival in downtown Sacramento. My time was 43:16, so I beat my time in the No Excuses 5K by 7 seconds.
I didn’t think I was going to, either.
So, like I said, I was telling Jesse the other day that I know the time would come that I would have to stop running to Godsmack. I just can’t imagine doing it. I even had a day last week when I said that I didn’t put in the concert DVD and instead just put my iPod on Shuffle. I was just doing a quick and dirty run to get some APs in and help stave off any weight gain from my period (which totally swideswiped me by coming six days early, by the way!). So, I threw on the iPod and was just going along, and of course, I fast-forwarded through slow stuff, old stuff, etc, etc. So, what do you think all the songs I hit and stopped on were?
Right. All the Godsmack stuff. It’s just so motivating to me right now. It’s what I’m used to. It’s emotional and helps keep me out of the physical portion of my brain that can start to concentrate on the fact that I’m hot or tired or wiped out and just not able to go on. It keeps me in that mental/emotional place where I’m running for a reason. I’m running to a beat. I’m running for myself, to prove something, to get the anger out, to break myself in order to get to the higher level. With the exception of “Can’t Buy Me Love” by The Beatles, I skipped over everything else that came on just to get to what I’m used to.
I’ve even been collecting a mental list of alternate running songs: Bigger Than My Body by John Mayer, Gone by Kelly Clarkson and Your Worried Mind by Vanessa Lowe are strong contenders; but when push has come to shove, it’s been the same ole, same ole.
However, part of my reasoning for wanting something new to run to is the obvious: It’s getting predictable and a little bit boring.
So, the least part that I did for today’s run was to throw in a couple of new songs and to mix up the order. It gave my brain something to do while I was running. I took off all of the time manipulations on the songs, and just let it play through. So, I was able to concentrate on timing and figure out where I might be at any given point.
Well, that didn’t really work too well. Even though I moved the songs around, I totally forgot that part and was really confused when Running Blind didn’t start. By the third or fourth song, I remembered that I had moved it to the end.
Close to the end, I was trying to figure out my timing (I really should just, you know, buy a watch, I guess) and the mix hit Faceless and I started getting bummed out, thinking that the next song was Running Blind and with over a half a mile to go, my time was in the crapper. I started trying to comfort myself, thinking that if I can just do it under 45 minutes, then that’s fine. That’s just fine.
And then I realized, as Faceless was ending that I forgot that I moved Keep Away to be after Faceless and so I wouldn’t even be hearing Running Blind that soon. Then I just sort of realized that mixing things up had the exact effect that I was hoping for. I was too damn confused by the mix to even realize how I was running, how long, how far I had to go or how tired I was.
I finally gave up trying to figuring it out when I hit the three-mile mark. At that point, I was just trying to decide if I was going to give it the last minute sprint like I’d done at No Excuses. There were already two or three women who’d passed me who I contemplated sprinting to get past, but didn’t bother. I just told myself that as long as I was close to 45 minutes when I rounded the corner to the finish line, then I would just not worry about it.
So, I round the corner and the damn clock is at 43:19. I let out a nice “aaaaaahhhhh!!!” and even though I knew I couldn’t get to the finish in 4 seconds, I kicked it in gear and ran my little heart out to the finish. When the clock clicked to 23, I let out a nice “DAMN!” and crossed the finish line like 5 seconds later.
Then, of course, realized that duh. I didn’t cross the starting mat right at 00:00 seconds. I really need to remember that one of these times. So, even though I came in at 43:28 by the clock, my adjusted time based on crossing the timing mats was 43:16. So, I beat my last time by seven seconds.
It wasn’t a fluke.
Am I runner yet?
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Cool Running Log has been updated. I’m taking a much deserved day off tomorrow. Rawr!