9k

A friend of mine ran a marathon (her first!) on Sunday. Another friend ran a half-marathon and had a PB time that was almost 10 minutes faster than her last half marathon. Another couple friends ran a training run of 19k.

I, along with the HUGE help of my friend and super-star ego-booster Ange, ran a 9k.

In distance, this seems puny compared to the rest of the distance accomplishments my friends achieved this past Sunday, but to me... this WAS like running my own marathon.

Even now, I still find myself fighting the mind games that go along with this run:
I "only" ran 9k... no, I RAN 9k... when many others did not run at all!
My time was not even worth mentioning... NO, I ran 9k in 1:18 including a pee break at the library.
My hamstring began throwing spasms once every km or so after passing (about) the 4k mark... BUT I COMPENSATED AND KEPT GOING.
There were hills I didn't expect which excuses the time... I FOUGHT TO GET UP THOSE HILLS NO MATTER HOW SLOW A JOG IT TOOK ME.
Most importantly, we increased our speed (if only by a little) for the last 300 meters.

WE FINISHED STRONG.

I purposefully left my bus pass at home.
I purposefully planned a route that would take me on a big loop and would not give me any options of cutting the run short (unless I wanted to go up big hills... no thanks!).
I purposefully ensured I had company on my run (and good company at that!)
I purposefully avoided the running room so that I didn't feel that "guilt" of keeping others back nor did I start off my run with that negative self-talk telling me how slow I was and how I will never be able to keep up with the runners ahead of me.

Ange had to stop me a few times on the run... telling me "not to talk or think like that" when she would catch me starting with the negative talk. She told me I would be so happy once I finished the run and should be proud of accomplishing it.

And she was right.

In the end, I was proud. And BOY did that lemon-lime freezy, followed by a cool beer, followed by a cool shower ever feel FAN-FREAKING-TASTIC.

Ange was bringing her son to his swimming lesson after the run and was sweet enough to post some food for thought on my facebook page. She told me when she headed to Westboro, she decided to "out of curiosity" see how far 9kms felt in the car. It took her driving from our neighbourhood all the way to Dovercourt to get to the 9k distance.

That's pretty darned cool. :)