"The saddest thing in life is wasted talent." A Bronx Tale: Pre Dallas Marathon

I don’t think I’ve ever blogged before a race. To be honest, I wish I had before the One City Marathon in March. I keep asking myself “was I this nervous”, “did I feel ready”….it would be nice to have something in writing to reference. The only thing I have is this lovely interview I did with my local newspaper before my last marathon: video

For those of you who actually read my blog that I haven’t told, I will be racing the Dallas Marathon on December 13^th, my birthday WTF. I didn’t plan it that way. It just happens to fall on my birthday. I can think of a thousand other things I’d rather be doing…like sleeping in until 10 am, sipping mimosas, followed by a full body massage…NOT covering 26.2 miles by foot on asphalt.

No matter what happens. I will be doing this 2 days after the Marathon. Tickets booked. Trip planned :)

How all this came about

As a member of the National Black Marathoners Association I’ve been lucky enough to keep in touch with one of the co-founders (Tony Reed...he's awesome. Tony - if you're reading this I will see you in 2 weeks!). He mentioned attending the 2015 NBMA Hall of Fame and Awards Banquet…and recommended doing the full marathon. Ummmm yeah no thanks (to the latter). At the time, I had just bombed my last triathlon, I was totally exhausted from racing, and I still had some painful memories from trying to recover from my last marathon. It just didn’t sound appealing. Oh and I prefer doing a 16-week marathon training cycle. If I decided to go through with it I would only have 10 weeks to prepare. Plus I would have to travel to Dallas and run 26.2 miles on my birthday.

I’m crazy and a weirdo and I like to torture myself so of course I signed up. I now have less than two weeks before I toe the starting line. Time flies.

I have a laundry list of things I am currently nervous about….

- Race day weather – please don’t be windy, please be on the cooler side, please don’t rain

- The course. Dear Hills, go easy on me

- Traveling solo…it will just be me, myself, and I, in a new city, far from home

- Hitting “the wall”. You know that awful feeling when you use up all of your glycogen stores and have 0% energy and there’s not a darn thing you can do about it

- Staggering to the finish line (see above)

- Or worse, DNF’ing (for my non athlete friends this means Does Not Finish)

- Or even worse, not reaching my goals

Wow, it actually helps to write this stuff down. In my head it felt like 1,000 things. Seven isn’t so bad J

On the contrary, I’m excited about….

- Attending the pre-race banquet – there will be some talented and amazing people attending that I plan to stalk

- Race day – that moment when the gun goes off and the nerves and obsessive thoughts suddenly and unexpectedly disappear, and a calmness takes over

- Running in a new city… I like to sightsee. Although, I’d prefer it not be 26.2 miles on foot

- Meeting new people…I’ve made lifelong friends through this sport...on the starting line, on line at the porta potty, etc...seriously

- Crossing the finish line – that moment is so indescribable. I smile just thinking about it

- Possibly exceeding my expectations

One of the times I exceeded my expectations.

Looking at the big picture

Even though I've only had 10 weeks to prepare, my training has been pretty flawless. I’ve done some killer workouts – a few 20-milers, a 15-miler at goal pace, tempo runs, AND I’ve managed to stay consistent on the bike and in the pool. Best of all, I managed a pretty big half marathon PB (personal best) 3 weeks ago.

Virginia Running Festival Half Marathon

First Female, PR, 1:26:57, 6:39/mile pace

I love Flat-Out races.

I’ve only had two hiccups...who has a flawless marathon build up?? 1) I was super fatigued at the end of October and had a crappy race – most likely from over-training. 2) I took a nasty and embarrassing spill on Saturday. I’m black and blue and there was some swelling but it hasn’t impacted my training….good sign.