It’s 1 month away from race day and I am a little nervous. The “nervousness” that I feel, however, is not the nervousness that you normally feel prior to a key race. More accurately, it is the lack of nervousness and excitement that brings on my un-ease. This same thing had happened prior to my Chicago Marathon experience. I assumed that this phenomenon was due to my career changes. At the time, I wasn’t worried for two reasons. I knew that my training had been good and that I had peaked appropriately. I also knew that I had my Plan B in my back pocket.
As the California International Marathon (CIM) approaches, I don’t have the same level of confidence in my abilities. The fact that it doesn’t “feel” like I am doing another marathon has changed the “feel” of my training. To me it is becoming obvious that my lack of excitement and the pre-race jitters directly relates to my grieving. The numbness is probably a way of sheltering me from the bad feelings that I would rather not feel day in and day out.
I do *want* to BQ at CIM but, aside from my numbness, I am wondering if I am past my peaking point and on my way over the hill. In my reasoning, I don’t see any reason why I couldn’t peak again. Now would be the time to do it. I didn’t experience any issues coming out of Chicago. Instead of an “A race, Chicago was another not-so-fun long run. The issues with my schedule have led me to skipping critical runs. I need to find importance and generate some enthusiasm for my new goal in order to make the rest of my training what it needs to be. I don’t want to be left wondering if I have what it takes on race day to hit my goal.
So much of race performance hinges on where one’s head is at when they are toeing the line on race day. I wish that I was in a better space right now, but I am not. I hope that in the next month, I can get to where I need to be to have something to celebrate on December 2nd.
I know that, ultimately, it is up to ME to get to the finish within 3 hours and 50 minutes of my crossing the starting line. I count on my friends and family (even strangers) to encourage me by cheering me on. To encourage them, I’ve had a singlet made at the Running Banana showing my name and profile picture on the front and my masthead (blog banner) and host site on the back. If you see me, please say something positive to keep me going.
Nobody can *do* it for me. I know that sometimes my head just isn’t into my training. My BQ is important to me so, I will dig deep to give it a little more. On race day, I’ll give it my best.