Mind over Matter

If there's one thing I've learned about working out, especially running, it's that it is 90% percent mental. Our bodies are way more capable than we think they are.  I can't tell you how many times I didn't want to work out, or didn't feel well enough to, but manage to get it done anyway.  It really is amazing what you can accomplish once you set your mind to something.

As I mentioned before, a friend of mine challenge me on Nike+ to run 50 miles in two weeks.  I thought he was crazy at first...there was no way I could get that done.  But I'm not one to back down from a fight, so not only was I going to do it, I was determined to win. 

I kept a pretty strong lead for most of the race, but had fallen behind on Wednesday.  I was going to have to do a pretty epic run to catch up.  I didn't sleep well Tuesday night.  We were down the shore at my parent's house and the girls woke up a few times.  We spent the morning at the beach, then home for a delicious BBQ.  After that we packed up the car and took the 2 hour drive home.  Not exactly great pre-running conditions.  But I had to do it.  So we brought in our stuff, I changed real quick, and I headed out again.  For really long runs, I prefer to go to this 6-mile each way running trail through the woods about 15 minutes from our house.  There are water fountains and bathrooms along the route, and it is just the perfect place to run.  

Everything was going smoothly until the 0.7 mile marker when I cam across this:

Umm, not okay.  I text Skip, furious at the situation?  What was I going to do?  Well I finally decided to put on my big girl panties and just deal with it.  A few other runners just ran around the barricade since the workers weren't there anymore, so I decided to do the same.  Sadly the road was closed off again at the 1.6 mile marker, but this time you couldn't go around it.  So instead I had to piece-meal together a route to get the mileage I wanted to.  It was annoying, and I wanted to quick and just go home so many times.  But I had promised myself I would aim for 7 miles, and I would not give up before that.  Was it hard?  Absolutely.  But when I got back to my car after running 7.6 miles?  Every step was worth it.  I seriously felt on top of the world.  

If you had asked me two weeks ago to run 7 miles, I would have laughed in your face.  But this challenge made me push myself in ways I didn't think was possible.  And I'm so happy I did.

Sadly, I did lose the challenge though.  I was heading out the door yesterday morning at 7:30 to run my last four miles, I got a notification saying my friend had just made it to 50 miles.  I lost by an hour!  But hey, he got up at 5:45 to run...that alone makes him deserve to be the winner.  

So I did it.  50 miles in 11 days {well 10 since I took a day off}  And honestly, it was all a mind game.  My body was always able to keep up with what I wanted it to do...it was just finding the motivation that was hard.  

So my advice is, challenge yourself.  Challenge someone else.  Whatever your fitness goals are, YOU CAN DO THEM.  You just have to put your mind to it.  Because last year I couldn't believe when I ran my first 3 miles.  Now I'm researching half marathons.  Like Nike says, you can do it!