I didn't wake up nervous about being able to reach my goal pace. Yes, I still hoped to complete the 4 miles in 30 minutes per my schedule's dictation, but that was not the root cause of my stomach churning.
Let me pause for a second to say this: I run for fun. Challenging, painful tempo runs are fun. Nerve-wracking, but still fun. I've had enough years of being obsessed with times, goals, PR's, paces and putting those things before everything else. For me, high school and college cross country running were my life. I took it far too seriously, had far too little enjoyment and treated it like my job. Looking back, it is all absolutely ridiculous. I was just a kid. Why didn't I just have fun? Loading into a 15-passenger van, being driven to go run 90 minutes on beautiful uncharted trails with my best friends sounds like an absolute dream now. What I wouldn't give to go back and relive those days to their fullest.. to enjoy them this time around, to live, to laugh, to stop caring that I finished behind a few faster teammates. I always had to be better, to be faster. It was rare that I completed a race feeling happy with my time or performance. I can remember that occurrence maybe twice. EVER. In 7 years of running. That breaks my heart. I know that I can not return to those days but I also want to make sure other young (or new) runners don't waste their years obsessing over such non-sense. Yes, try your best, run fast, break records, set new PR's, have goals, never give up, but have fun. For crying out loud, just have some fun. Trust me, in 10 years no one is going to remember that you ran your 4 mile tempo run at 7:50 pace rather than 7:43 pace. Or that you finished 6th rather than 5th and got a different color medal. In the end, no one really cares.
So it was not the actual run that had my butterflies jetting in circles, rather it was the awareness of the pain that was going to ensue on the run. The knowledge of what I was about to put my body through. At 5am, I reminded myself again that I am a mother, my job right now is to be the best I can for my kids. I am not going running right now, so I'll think about the workout later. And then we made some of the most delicious chocolate vegan cupcakes! At 6am. And then we ate them. Yes, at 6am. For breakfast. We did also eat oatmeal and strawberries, and the cupcakes were mini-sized. (I'll write more about our vegan baking/eating adventures in a future blog post. I have been thinking about it, but haven't quite put all the pieces together in my mind for that post yet.)
Cupcakes eaten, teeth brushed, clothes thrown on and we were out the door for preschool drop-off. We drove today to get Isaac home in time for his morning nap. Back home, nursed and peacefully asleep, I used my 45 min "break" to speed-fold laundry, start a new load, read through nursery school board emails and chart out a few possible 4-mile loops on MapMyRun. I was hesitant to repeat last Wednesday and so I wanted to check out other courses in the neighborhood. It had to be not-too-boring, pretty, wide enough streets to be safe running with Isaac in the Chariot, few cars and not crazy hilly. Before I knew it, Isaac was moaning and sitting up in bed. I scooped him up, loaded him in the newly inflated tire Chariot (PSI was down to 10! Oops, supposed to be at 40) and ran up towards Mulholland. I still hadn't decided on a route and the mountains always call me upwards. So up I went, until we reached the top. Category 5-climb warm-up complete, and I swerved the Chariot to the right, skipping our gorgeous trail route to make our way towards a less-steep, more paved 4 mile loop. We ran, fast, in my hot pants.
I still remember the day I bought my hot pants. They're red, short (2" inseam short), spandex Nike running shorts. A tall, fast, 30-something Russian lady was wearing the exact pair at the Chicago Niketown Running Club one Thursday evening, back when I was in High School. I think the year was 2001. I admired how they accentuated her long, toned running quads. After the run, I bought myself a pair... to be saved for fast days. They have mostly lived in the back of my drawer, in Chicago, in Claremont where I went to college, in Santa Monica post-college while at UCLA for grad school and now in Woodland Hills where I live with my family of five. I nearly gave them away to my sister a few times, considered tossing them in that Goodwill donation bag last year, but something has always made me hold on to them. Maybe it is the promise, or the hope of running fast again. Of competing. If you wear hot pants, you better be running fast.
What is fast? That's the beauty of it.. it's up to you to decide, it's personal. Whatever is fast for you, that is your fast. I wish I could have understood this 5 or 10 years ago, then I would have had a lot more fun running, I can tell you that. Now I honestly believe that fast can come in the form of 15 minute miles or 5 minute miles.
Today I needed a little extra motivation. It came in the form of red, Nike hot pants. To run fast, you have to feel fast. You have to believe you are fast. Conquering those mental mountains is always the toughest challenge. Feeling fast, Isaac and I ran those 4 miles to our hearts content, legs pumping, breathless and brave, we completed the loop in exactly 30 minutes. I didn't even know it until I came home and re-mapped out our route online. I was actually a bit surprised. I wasn't sure I could keep a 7:30/mile pace while pushing him. We conquered those mental mountains, baby. And then we (read: I) had another cupcake.
Run your own fast. Have fun. And eat cupcakes. That was our Wednesday.
Partaking in one of the best parts of vegan baking: eating the raw leftover batter!
Happy Wednesday! Get your own cupcake.
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