cornfields, surreality, measuring up, not vomiting, other stuff... are you inspired yet?

i don't usually remember all the mile splits for my runs as i am doing the run. but yesterday early evening i ran 5 miles, and i was very aware of each one. it was a bumpy road in some parts, but i definitely came out on top. somehow it's a really long story for only 5 miles, but apparently i have a lot to say.

it mostly starts with pretzels.

my stomach was a little iffy yesterday, but i knew i could go for my run as planned. but then at some point in the afternoon, i fell a bit comatose into a short nap, and when my alarm got me up again, groggy, i wanted a little snack, and i remembered that i am going to try snacking on a few pretzels on my long run sunday, to see whether a little more salt staves off the hamstring doom cramping. but that meant i had a bag of pretzels at hand, so i had a handful of little pretzels. and my stomach thought that was a BAD idea. ... unfortunately, it didn't mention that until a mile into the run.

so: i ran out into the sunshine. it was pretty lovely out; the sun was not yet setting, but slanting through the trees in a crisp fall way. ok, sun can't slant crisply. this isn't a haiku. the point was, it was sunny and it *looked* like fall. however it was also humid and 25C. this is relevant.

on yesterday's agenda, according to the plan (aka the slavedriver), was a 5 mile tempo, which meant i should have been running at a consistent pace of ... oh god, who knows at this point. i think the most realistic pace calculator calculation would say 9-minute miles. ok, so i ran one mile out in the slanty sun, and it beeped in at 8:54. which was just great. except then i noticed i was not feeling up to running that pace for 4 more miles. and also i wanted to puke a little. oh dear.

i turned right on this road which runs parallel to a US highway, where the landscape here changes abruptly from suburban strip malls, older 50s style house and newer student apartments and condos, to ... cornfields. i mean, actual cornfields. and in between and around these cornfields are small office parks with 4 or 5 brick office buildings that are made to look like residential bungalows (why??), as well as a fair number of remaining trees, and the occasional house whose provenance is completely unclear -- who on earth lives there? -- and then more corn. or at least fields. yesterday, they all seemed to be full of 5 foot corn.

it's kind of surreal, that this area of cornfields, trees and suburban orthodontist offices is 1.2 miles from our apartment. it's also kind of surreal that this place has a sidewalk? i really don't think anybody else is using it. perhaps pre-2008 crash, those corn fields were all going to become business parks? it's a little eerie. they're still building more student apartments and condos and so on up there, though.

but yesterday: i was running along this sidewalk, and the sun was pretty and so was the corn and the sky was blue and sidewalk was wide and all mine, but unfortunately i wanted to vomit. so i kept running. i told myself that i only had one more mile and then there was just a 5k left. how this was supposed to be comfort, i don't know. i mean, i still wanted to puke. but i knew i wouldn't, really, and my ipod was playing stupid songs but it's misbehaving and i can't fastforward it right now... and then! lo and behold. up beyond the cornfields, in the sunlight, there emerged a green shining glass fortress!

it's true. half a mile ahead, up around a comfortable bend in the road, which was surely invented by a road planner who envisioned the majesty of a bend in the road, surrounded by a sea of corn, because there is no natural landmark requiring anything but straw-straight roads... there was (is) this emerald city, dazzling in the sun. how on earth is there an epic glass castle out here? why? how? who goes there? am i really only 1.34 miles from my apartment? (oh GOD is that really how little distance has elapsed since i last checked? i still definitely want to vomit)... and of course it turns out that gleaming glass building is the headquarters of the local university's Credit Union.

so i ran to the corn-wreathed credit union. and my Garmin beeped: mile 2 at 8:58. well, nice that i'm holding this pace, despite the vomit thing. it's definitely too hot out to be pumpkin spice latte season. ugh.

to make things even more surreal, the credit union building has a large immaculate parking lot on all four sides, and around that is a paved 1 mile trail. 1 mile total, yes. and why is it there? did someone at the credit union get a grant to support employee health and so install this paved trail -- complete with wildflower beds, tasteful trash cans and park benches every 100 metres? seriously. and the building had maybe 15 cars in the huge lot, and no humans could be seen. and the sun shone on, and the corn waved in the wind, and i ran around about a third of the mile-long paved trail. even in that little section, there were THREE maps indicating exactly where i was on the trail. um, but where? how could you get lost?! there is only one path, and wherever you are, you can always look around across the wildflowers and shrubs and see the huge credit union building, being the ONLY building anywhere in sight, looming like the freakin Eiffel Tower, and know exactly where you are! this thing is the weirdest. ... so i did a little bewildered loop all on my own on this freakishly well-maintained useless trail, and then i went back the way i came. i got back to slightly more familiar roads surrounded by the condos and apartments, and i STILL wanted to vomit. uuuugh. i started bargaining with myself about only running a 5k and then walking the rest. i knew i would hate that. marathon training confidence, is not what that would build. i reminded myself i wasn't *really* going to puke. it would pass... and then mile 3 beeped. 9:00 min/mile exactly.

half of mile 4 took me back close to the trails right by our house, and i started to think that i was doing ok. my legs were already a little sore before this run from the plyo class i went to the day before (uh, it's sort of intervals-bootcampy exercise? lots of 'ballistic' motion, done in intervals) and the class had been hard and full of 20 year olds, but i had definitely held my own, and only moderate soreness both made me feel strong, and also that my self-crosstraining lately hasn't been too wimpy like i worried, because this class in which i was measuring myself against others didn't kill me. i know it shouldn't work that way, but it does. i especially know i shouldn't do that because when i have taught group exercise classes at the Y i yell at people (it's a kickboxing class, i'm supposed to yell) that nobody cares what they look like as they flail along, because unless you're doing it wrong, you should be too busy with your own flailing to look at anybody else. but when honest: i know it's not true, i'm watching the other people in class, not wanting to fall behind even when we're doing exercises on our own. in fact i try to make myself get up close to the mirror, not to be a vain douche, but so i'm distracted enough by my own form to ignore everybody else. it's not an impressive fact, but i kind of doubt it's that uncommon. i'm not sure if this means i should stop lying to my kickboxing classes (when i get back to them next year), or lie differently or something.

so remember, i was running (oh right, this is about running) along during mile 4, still wanting to puke, but recognizing that my tired legs were tired, but no more tired than when i started, and not hurting in any worrying way. here i was running along a bigger road, and in light of the humid hot-ish weather, i had worn a spandex-y lime green tank top, and i'm not being hard on myself when i say it's not the most flattering piece of clothing i own. that's ok. when i wear it, i feel like i'm saying 'yeah, i'm lumpy and jiggly, whatever, i'm still really strong.' and related to the unimpressive gym stuff above, i notice that when i'm wearing such a top, and i'm running on a busier road, i run faster than when on an empty one, wearing something flowing. apparently i feel the need to impress the people driving by? who might be couch potatos and might be college varsity rockstars and might be too crippled to even walk and might be all sorts of things and are probably too busy with their own lives to care about the woman in the lime green tank top with some fat around her waist? right. anyway i was trying to tell myself that the goal was excellent form for its sake alone, and not for the drivers, and i remembered i'm trying to stay careful with my gait and keep my hamstrings happy, and they *were* happy, it was going fine, i was keeping it together although maybe not running any faster, and i turned off onto a little road that leads behind a huge grocery store, to a path to my familiar trails, now about a mile from home though only 3.4 miles in. this road turned out to have a human gazelle on it: college girl, wearing racing kit, doing drills, warming up for no doubt 6 minute miles. ... but you know, i felt ok to just keep going at my 9 min/mile pace, and we exchanged nods and smiles as i passed by and headed back to the little trailhead.

and then i realized, finally, that i didn't want to puke anymore! i was too hot and thirsty and tired and would have preferred to stop running probably, but the lack of nausea was pretty exciting. so! i told myself i was going to finish the 5 miles, and so turned off the pavement to a trail detour through the woods a bit, to make the route long enough... and mile 4 beeped in on my Garmin at 9:01.

of course at this point my ipod with its capricious and unalterable song order started playing this lovely french ballad, yeah no, that's not going to help me here, and i turned the damn thing off.

i told myself that i had just run 3 uncomfortable miles. but that was ok: in a month (from today as a matter of fact) i will run 26 miles, and probably a lot more than 3 of them will be uncomfortable. i told myself to remember how those three felt, to remind myself when i'm feeling really shitty in the marathon that i can run 3 bad miles, and then the next one can still be better. to make that last point more convincing, though, this last mile in the woods, with no music but no vomit, was going to be my fastest mile today. i told myself i could be a little more uncomfortable. i tried to speed up just a bit; i didn't let myself look at my pace on my watch once, because i was pretty sure i could feel how fast i was running, and it felt about right. hard but not deadly. in that last half mile i was on a more populated trail, and i used each person i saw as an excuse to run better, with better form, making it look easier than it felt, again why? but it helped, and though i was breathing hard it was still rhythmic, i was hardly sprinting, and people and their dogs nodded and smiled as i passed them. and finally i got close to the end of that bit of trail, right beside our apartment complex and my watch beeped. mile 5: 8:52. bullseye.

so, i jogged back to our front door and came inside to get joyously greeted by the dog. it was a good run. and i felt like i banked a nugget of confidence, to use when i need it. (um, who banks nuggets? please insert reasonable metaphor as you like.)

in conclusion: yesterday before the nap and the run, a friend of mine in paris who is gearing up for a trail half marathon adventure told me she had come earlier to this blog looking for inspiration before going on a run, but i hadn't updated since sunday night. well! ... i sure hope she has a LOT of inspiration now, because i used a lot of damn words here to describe what was only 5 miles to and from a credit union of Oz in a cornfield.

this weekend is long run time. i am still on the fence about whether to make my final (all-at-once) 20 miler this weekend or next -- turns out there are two versions of the plan online, and they arguably differ as to whether you're a marathon novice or not (obviously yes), and the novice one has its 20 miler four weeks out not three. ... so tomorrow i will decide if i am mentally ready for 20 miles this sunday. i might be!

lots more confidence nuggets to mined there, i bet. ugh. (very quietly: remind me why i signed up for this?)

more sunday night. stay tuned.