RunEatRalph

For me to run as fast as you do, it would have to be a bit more physical than that. 😂

I love this.

Hey Loopsters! It's been a while, but I wrote this one because I had an epiphany (?) of sorts. I don't want to overshare with weekly updates and whatnot, but I thought this one might be useful to somebody out there. Hey, hey hey! After last Sunday’s half marathon (read about it here, if you like), I’ve had some thoughts about how it went and what I might have learned from it. There are lessons to be learned from so many races that we run, both the good and the bad (probably the ugly too). I’ll share these thoughts with you runners out there and hope that they help. Running Shamrock was a total surprise. I wasn’t aware that I’d be running it until less than a week until race day. The next half marathon on my actual schedule is the Kentucky Derby Festival Mini on April 27th. To be honest, I haven’t REALLY been training for it anyway. I made a training plan, only to not stick to it AT ALL. I think it’s a combo of my injury and the winter, but I just haven’t had “the drive” in me for a while. It’s that and I’ve been enjoying myself too much just running to run. The plan for Shamrock was that I didn’t have a plan. I just started running. After the first mile, my watch told me I’d run a 7:00 mile. As you can see, the first 4 miles were all right at 7:00/mile or so. Here’s what’s crazy to me. I hadn’t run 4 miles straight at that pace since October (I had to look it up). I can’t speak for everyone, but I think that we often worry about getting out of shape quickly, or that we need to work hard to maintain a certain level of fitness. I’m starting to believe that maybe it’s just the mind that gets out of shape quickly. I’ve been running and racing for 10 years now. I’ve ramped up and I’ve wound down, so many times that I can’t count. Sometimes we are confident in our fitness and in our training, and we decide to go for that PR. Other times, our feet drag and we feel like we’re working WAY harder than the pace would have us think we should. Don’t get me wrong, training hard and putting in the work pays off and slacking can hurt performance, but maybe it isn’t as critical as we believe it to be. Other than some unfortunate potty stops, I strung together quite a few fast miles for a guy that hadn’t been running long or running fast. My body remembered how to run fast miles. My mind just had to give it a chance to prove that.

"There is a huge difference between actual injury pain and just being uncomfortable. We spend most our lives in comfort. Heating & air-conditioning. Full bellies. Overstuffed chairs. For millennia, we survived as a species without these things. And don’t get me wrong, I enjoy my creature comforts. But, I do think that there is some merit in the primal feeling of scraping the bottom of your physical ability." YES.

Your positive attitude will go a long way! I love your plan to embrace science.

Hello, hello, hello! Here we are already into the last week of January. Time is flying by, so we’ll probably all be singing Christmas songs again before we know it. I’ve been posting for several weeks about how happy I am to not be training for anything and that I’m enjoying running just to run. Welp, time’s up. At 13 weeks to go until Kentucky Derby, it’s time I start to do a little more than just run for fun. I still haven’t decided how I’m going to treat this race, but I want options. This means I need to get myself up at uncomfortable paces again. The track is SO miserable in the winter so I might not start that up for another month or so, but it’s tempo time! I plan to add a mile or so to a weekly tempo run every couple of weeks. That should get me to a fast half marathon distance by race day! This week in running has been pretty chill for the most part. Chill as in both laid back AND cold. I think I’m starting to figure out how to properly dress. Shut up, weather app. You don’t know anything! Monday was 4 FREEZING miles with running buddy Brooke. The bridges made some awful sounds as we ran across them. Luckily I work with some sharp engineers that came up with some solid explanations. Brooke said it was like the bridges that collapse as you run across them on Super Mario games. We did pick up the pace a bit haha. Tuesday was more cold and more coffee. We didn’t take any pictures though. Step up, Wade and Alissa! This one was another 4 miles. There was talk of a 5th mile, but I just wanted the coffee. I didn’t run at all on Wednesday through Friday, which wasn’t exactly what I had in mind. I got sick (again!) and figured I needed a break. I didn’t take a total break though at least. I managed to work out pretty hard with kettlebells on Wednesday and I played some basketball on Thursday. Friday just ended up being a little too busy. That happens. I wasn’t exactly ALL better. I look awful. Saturday I ran 7 miles. For the first 2 or 3, I felt pretty good! After 5, I started to feel pretty run down (pun intended). Sometimes you think you’re all better after a good night’s sleep, but there’s a little bit of sickness still there. That was this morning. Oh well, I don’t think I broke anything haha. I’ll be working on a training plan over the weekend to ramp up to be ready for the Kentucky Derby Mini. I wish that I was a little more fired up mentally, but I think that’ll happen. It might just take a warm day. Hurry up, Spring!

It was definitely nonsense! 😀

Not much better than a small airport, as long as it has a bar.

I wasn't sure about reading a car-related death post, but this was AMAZINGLY good. You have a gift. I hope Nissan hooks you up.

Sounds pretty awesome. Anything that can make someone positively blog about the dreadmill must be good.

I'm pretty excited about the relay and YES a Loop team would be awesome. I didn't think about the fact that it's on Boston weekend. That might be a great consolation for those that don't get their BQs.

I wrote this at the end of last week, but I figured why not try to recruit some Loopsters to join me for some races. Happy Friday (Saturday now, but still happy), friends! It’s been a long week, but it’s SO CLOSE to being time to move into the good part. My week has been action packed in every way. Work has been busy (not such a bad thing) with lots of excitement going on. Jen and I are plotting our family vacation this year and are working between Myrtle Beach or DisneyWorld. It ain’t cheap haha. I’ve managed to run 4 days so far this week and plan on running a semi-long one tomorrow. The early wake ups are starting to wear me down a little and I need to focus on getting my butt in bed earlier if I’m going to keep doing it. I’m still running what I want, when I want, how I want for the most part and I don’t have a training plan. However, I DID sign up for some stuff! April is going to be a busy month. Race #1 – The Ville to Ville Craft Brew Relay This will be my first relay ever! The race starts in Asheville, NC and ends up in Greenville, SC for a total of 75 miles. As the name implies, THERE WILL BE CRAFT BREW. I should end up running one or two legs of the race, which means no more than 20 miles or so total. Our team isn’t really all that competitive, so I can run at a semi-leisurely pace and I don’t require a ton of intense training. I like that. Just tell me how far to the next brewery. Race #2 – The Kentucky Derby Festival Marathon and MiniMarathon 2 weeks later, it’ll be a trip to Louisville, KY for the mini marathon down in Louisville, KY. I have several reasons to be excited about this! Special edition whiskey? Sounds better than regular edition whiskey. There will be whiskey. There are several distilleries that I’d love to visit while I’m there. I randomly won free whiskey! Shoutout to @therunchat on Twitter for getting me hooked up with that. They can also save you $5 if you decide to sign up by using code CHAT2019. I’m excited like a kid to go to the Louisville Slugger factory. Baseball bats!!! I’m on the fence about whether I’m going to really “race” this one and try to PR or just enjoy it. We shall see…

That was exactly the message that I was trying to convey! I love the thought of stoking the competitive fire. My running buddies are trying to bring it out of me all the time. It's coming for sure. I want to at least hold out a month or two haha.

I know exactly how you feel. I hope feeling normal comes soon.

Good luck with all of your 2019 goals! 2018 in pictures looked pretty great.