I still can’t believe that I did it! In retrospect, I realize that this is the most miles I’ve ever done in this short period of time and the longest I’ve gone without taking a day off! It’s one of the hardest things I’ve done and yesterday I turned 49 and 1/2! GO ME!
8/16/20: As soon as I hit my 120 miles!
Quick background about this race (TransRockies Run: 120 miles in 6 days with 20,000 ft of elevation gain):
- It’s been on my bucket list for about 5 years. When I heard about it and saw the pictures, I wanted to do it. It’s not a cheap race though so I wasn’t sure when I’d ever have the chance.
- Last year I had an opportunity to volunteer at the race which would help me get some credits to run it. It was one of the most amazing experiences and you can read about that here.
- This was my bucket list and A race this year. (While I absolutely love what I do for a living as a running coach, I have learned that I need at least one major event a year for me). But then COVID19 happened…and of course they had to cancel the event.
They announced a virtual option for either 60 or 120 miles to be completed in the 15 days and I had to sign up!
My original plan was to do the 60 miles because I’m in the middle of a few big projects and I knew it would be hard for me to try to make 8 miles a day happen with the 120 miles. However, the AZ Girls (last year’s volunteer crew) were all doing 120 miles and twisted my arm pretty quickly. I also had been averaging 25 miles weeks and I wanted this to be a challenge….and IT WAS!
If you follow me on Instagram, you’ll know that I posted an IG Story for just about every walk/run of the challenge. You can see the highlights here if you’re on IG.(tap on each story to move forward faster).
What did I learn while doing one of the? Here are a few of my key takeaways….
- I will be forever grateful for ChiRunning/ChiWalking. I never recommend doing mileage you are not trained for…but if you do, having good technique under your belt makes a HUGE difference. Although I walked about 60% of the mileage, I doubled my weekly mileage for 2 weeks. While I could feel a bit of tension (I stretched just about every day too) and fatigue in my legs, my body felt great the entire time.
- FOMO is real. I’ve blogged about this before too. Many of my TRU TRIBE teammates had signed up for the Great Race Across Tennessee (1000k to be finished from 5/1-8/31). I really really wanted to join them but I knew it would not be a good decision. I had too much on my plate and I really didn’t want to burn myself out (which I’ve done before and learned from that experience!) before this virtual race as it was my priority this year and I didn’t want to get distracted. I was planning on the 60 miles but as I mentioned before, between some arm twisting and a wee bit of FOMO, I decided to go for it. I don’t regret it even though I had a breakdown on social media in the middle of the challenge. (more on that below)
- I had a plan and followed it. As much as I would’ve liked to simulate the real race and do the 120 miles in 6 days, I knew that was unrealistic for many reasons. I planned to do 8 miles a day which was the daily average necessary to complete the challenge. I looked at my calendar for the 2 weeks and saw some days where I’d get more in and vice versa. I started tracking on my Fit Bit but that was using passive workouts which were not intentional and didn’t count. I switched to tracking with my Garmin mid race to get more accurate results. I was adding and averaging daily to see how much I had left as I progressed. This worked well for me. Although apparently on the TRR page, my totals ended at 118.3 because someone messaged me late on the last day to let me know this. I get in freak out mode but checked my Fitness Rankings totals. I sent a FB message to Houda (the race director) with pics and he said I was fine! Phew!
- Multi tasking and getting creative was necessary to get mileage done! Managing my time was probably my biggest obstacle. I had to get creative to get my mileage in:
- while I was walking, I used some of that time making phone calls and listening to podcasts
- I was able to schedule some of my mileage with friends and my TRU TRIBE. Some days I got one walk done and on some days I broke it up into 3 different workouts.
- I woke up before my “work” group runs a few times and ran 1/4 mile loops in my apartment parking lot just so I could get it done before it was a bazillion degrees
- It always boils down to mindset! While I am not a believer of mind over body (I’ve seen too many people get injured with this mind frame), I do believe in mind with body. Another principle I’ve embraced from ChiRunning. There is a big difference between ignoring your body and pushing through until you get injured VS. pushing through to overcome your mental setbacks.
- We’ve had the hottest summer on record in Arizona and this challenge was from 8/3-8/17: prime summer heat. I had to try and schedule runs early morning or after the sun went down. This was not always possible. Although I could not make the heat disappear with my mindset, I could certainly embrace it and know that “it is what it is.”. I had several days that I had to go out when the sun was beating down but I was safe by minimizing that time and being prepared for it and I embraced it. Constantly repeating how hot it is will not make it go away, as a matter of fact, it makes it worst. Accepting the heat and driving to my runs with my windows down rather than going from the AC cold car to the blazing heat really helped me acclimate. Here is my recent blog about how and why to run in the heat.
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- Once I had my mid race melt down, I was able to dig deep and remind myself of my Why. This is a question I ask all the athletes before they start training for a race with me. Even more important now that we don’t know if races are happening. This was going to be my big bucket list A race this year and I would’ve been training for 4 months leading up to it. That opportunity was taken away from me by COVID19 so I replaced it with the virtual event. I was going to finish this race no matter what it was going to take. Here is my IG post about my meltdown and the IGTV video that I did later that day.
- One of the things I loved/hated about the challenge was trying to figure how I was going to get it all done. It was so rewarding at the end to know that it all came together although I doubted myself several times!
Yesterday was 8/19, my half birthday. I turned 49 1/2 and I’ve never felt better! I know too many people that keep repeating how old they are, and how much harder things are….while some of this is fact that I can’t deny, mindset and how you take care of your body have a lot to do with this as well.
As I age, I keep surprising myself by doing things I never thought possible. This is a first time experience for me as far as number of miles in this short of time, without taking a day off….I have some pretty big goals as I prepare for my 50th year around the sun in 2021, and the real TransRockies Run is definitely on the list among a few other crazy endeavors…..stay tuned!
