Thursday, January 14, 2016

Yikes!! Four Weeks Till Mercedes!

"Sometimes I lie in bed at night and I ask 'Where did I go wrong?'. Then a voice says to me, 'This is going to take more than one night.'" - Charlie Brown

As Mary Engelbrit says "Time flies whether you're having fun or not". Well, time is sure flying for all of us. Just four weeks from Sunday, you Mercedes guys will be lining up for "Showtime in Birmingham". I hope all of you boys and girls are getting excited. Hope you're not saying to yourself "yikes, what have I done. I can't get ready in 4 weeks". You're right, you can't get ready in 4 weeks - you got ready in the months you've put behind you on the road, in the cold, in the rain, in the dark. Calm down. it's going to be fine.

This Sunday is 1st of two trial runs on the Mercedes course (the next is Jan 30th). For one week, Monica doesn't have to come up with a course that finds "The hidden roads of Birmingham". We will leave Boutwell Audtorium @ 6:30AM. Once again, Valerie McLean, the Mercedes Race Director and owner of the Trak Shak (where you should be getting all your running gear) will weave her magic and open the lobby of Boutwell so we can get out of the cold before we run. She and her staff will also provide aid stations and Gu on the course, so be sure to thank her. I understand the course is marked, but it's big M's with arrows on the pavement, so pay attention if you're separated from a big group (not that a big group can't get lost...they definitely can). So, one full loop will be 13.1 miles. You made a commitment, I made a commitment...let's go!!!! Show up!!! If you want to view the course, just go to the Mercedes Website. Man, I love technology!! If you have any concerns, email me.

What you need to do now is to go to the Mercedes Marathon website again and print out two copies of the course and have one at work and one at home. Learn the course's uniqueness - where the miles are, where the hills are, the aid stations, the porta-potties, turns, straightaways, EVERYTHING. Visualize running the race, picture yourself going up those hills, stopping at the aid stations, stopping at the porta-potties (OK, let's not visualize that!), and finally, see yourself getting to the finish line, people cheering, music playing, and a medal being placed around your neck. When you do these things in your mind, you should feel your pulse go up and your breathing getting more rapid. Why does that happen? Because your mind is so entwined with your body that it has trouble distinguishing between what is real or imagined, so it starts reacting like you are running, and it is doing something called "cerebral mapping". It is learning how to react in a situation and the more familiar it is to a situation, the calmer it is and the more it will react like it did in training (physical OR mental). If it knows what to expect, things will go a lot smoother. Getting out every weekend and putting in those long runs are for a reason folks, and one of those reasons is when you're deep in a race, your body will say "we've been here before" instead of "what in the sam-hill are you doing?!!". And when you sit and learn all the aspects of the race course, that mental training will pay off big.

It just slays me when I talk to runners after a marathon and they say "I didn't know it was going to be that hilly" - DID YOU NOT LOOK AT THE COURSE DESCRIPTION BEFORE THE RACE? Sometimes the Race Director will be a little deceiving with his "rolling hill" baloney, but you can usually see an elevation map on the website. I think Mercedes will be using Powerade as their aid station drink and GU products for their gel, so start using that in your training runs.

BTW, if you're thinking of using a Pace Group during your race, you should read this post in my RUNNING WITH AL blog  that I wrote a couple of years ago about what goes through the mind of a Pace Leader. I used to write a weekly blog about my running, but sort of got off the track and haven't written in a few months. I really enjoyed writing it, so I need to get back on that horse. Anyway, I think there will be pacers at the trial run Sunday, so hook up and leave your worries to somebody else (well, some of your worries!).

I'll see you on the roads - AL

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