On I went, out of the wood, passing the man leading without knowing I was going to do so. Flip-flap, flip-flap, jog-trot, jog-trot, curnchslap-crunchslap, across the middle of a broad field again, rhythmically running in my greyhound effortless fashion, knowing I had won the race though it wasn't half over, won it if I wanted it, could go on for ten or fifteen or twenty miles if I had to and drop dead at the finish of it, which would be the same, in the end, as living an honest life like the governor wanted me to. -Alan Sillitoe, "Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner"

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Can I tell you a secret?

Well, I learned how to stretch yesterday at PT after the therapist told me that I failed my flexibility test "miserably."  While he was having me bend and contort, I kept hearing these noises from him: "Oh, WOW," "Oooh!," "Oh, yeah, that's bad..."  You get the drift.  Anyway...  I have stretching exercises to do.  

In the meantime, here's a funny comic for you:
And here's my secret.  Shhhh.... don't tell anyone.

I'm tired of the marathon.  Already.

I'm excited about MY marathon, yes.  But I'm tired of marathon updates on facebook and twitter and in the news and it feels like I'm just being completely bombarded by marathon overload and I'm so over it!

I'm being a bitter person by not allowing my friends/acquaintances their first-time marathon excitement because I'm so jaded.  And of course, you can probably guess that my jaded-ness comes at least partly out of nerves.  And largely out of this stupid rest I'm taking.  I didn't need to tell you that, did I?

I know I'll get excited once the subway billboards come up and I have to start making actual arrangements.  But in the meantime, don't be shocked if I'm looking at you with boredom when you talk about which gels you prefer, or if I'm rolling my eyes privately as I'm reading about how excited someone was when they did their first EVER!!! 10 or 12 or 18 mile run.  I want to be excited and not jaded but I'm too scared about my own race to get rid of my stupid "yeah, been there, done that" bravado.

Hmm... good blog idea: which gels I prefer!  Because it's novel when I do it, and annoying when others do.  Right?
Posted by at

5 comments:

  1. Silly Girl RunningThu Aug 26, 09:26:00 AM EDT

    Hahaha! That comic is funny! :) And since I'm not a first time marathoner anymore (since July 31st, but who's counting), I can relate with the not liking the first ever 18 miler, etc. talk. I'm all over BQ and marathon pace talk, now. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  2. MichaelThu Aug 26, 02:00:00 PM EDT

    So what stretching exercises are you (we) supposed to do?

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousThu Aug 26, 02:50:00 PM EDT

    I'll try not to take this personally!

    Sean @ NYRR
    www.facebook.com/home/NewYorkRoadRunners

    ReplyDelete
  4. TThu Aug 26, 05:20:00 PM EDT

    I haven't run anywhere near a BQ, so feel free to bombard me with pace talk - that's new! And Sean, don't take it personally :) I'm still super-excited about the marathon. Mike - I think I'll share the stretching exercises tomorrow. Tomorrow at my next PT appointment I'm supposed to learn all about foam rolling, so get ready for your "I told you so" :)

    ReplyDelete
  5. UnknownThu Aug 26, 08:40:00 PM EDT

    Foam rolling is pretty good, for reals. I'm kind of amazed you haven't encountered one yet in five (?) (!) marathon training cycles - only took me one and a half to get this messed up, ha ha!

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)