Three

I've got to step back into first-person for a bit.

It's already almost Friday. This week has just blown right by me. Three is nearly Two. Yikes.

I don't really have much to say tonight.

Today was really a rather calm day, with very few obsessive/compulsive moments, and no panic attacks or anything (FYI, the weather is still looking great).

I packed. I didn't take the customary picture of all the running junk this time though. That means one of two things. Either I will tear that bag apart in the morning and make certain everything is in there (then have to pack it all back up), or I won't, and I'll end up realizing something I forgot in the next couple days.  I'm pretty sure all the important stuff is in there. Well.. kinda sure. Maybe. Ok, I'm just going to have to peek in that bag tomorrow.

Also, we got a small pace / course talk from Steve before our run this evening. I am glad I went and listened to what he had to say. With a few small differences, he basically echoed how I plan to approach this race. That is a nice confidence boost.

And surprisingly, I think he actually answered yesterday's question about  why I find it easier to think about The Goal Time rather than The Goal Pace. I won't try to quote what he said, because I would just screw it up, but it made me realize that I just simply don't think about the race that way. The gist of his comment was Nobody actually runs goal pace. Which set something like the following train of thought into motion:

I want to get from Start to Finish in The Goal Time (or faster), and to achieve that, I'm going to run 4 to 5 miles at Feelsincrediblyslowbuthopefullyisn't Pace. Then I'll be running a whole bunch of miles at Speedybutefficient Pace. Somewhere, I'll have to switch to Mentalballsofsteel Pace, and then make a seamless transition into Justkeeppassingpeople Pace, whenever the time feels right. The final bit will be Alloutsprintinslomo Pace. Steve is right. None of those are actually The Goal Pace.

Hmm.. there were more words in there than I thought. Time to sleep.