Frickin Frigid

This has been the most terrible day in the history of Bloomsburg. For me. Well, kind of. It's been pretty terrible.

The power at my apartment has been down all day, and it's still down. We were advised to evacuate for the night, so I'm staying at Mike and Dan's place for the night.

It is sooo cold. Beyond cold in fact. Tomorrow morning it is going to feel liken negative 21 degrees with the wind chill, and we have morning practice at 6:30am. I called coach Karen to convince her to move practice to the rec. This is not something unusual... She's done that in the past for weather milder than this. But for some reason, she's not agreeing with me. We have to show up at the usual practice location tomorrow first, and then she'll decide where we go. Pointless. We'll end up wasting time and not having enough cars to get to the rec then. I'm fuming. Negative 21 degrees! And ice all over the sidewalks. Windy. FUMING.

That was the horrific day, now onto the terrific day... (Cheasy, yes.) Saturday I raced the 5K at Bucknell and finally qualified for PSACs with a time of 19:02. It was a GREAT feeling. I have not felt so elated after a race since freshman year. That time is even faster than any 5K time I ran in high school - granted any 5K in high school was on a cross country course and not on a track. Regardless, I think this means I'm finally back to where I was.

If you would have asked me three years ago where I thought I'd be by my junior year of college, I would have said running under 18 minutes, but I guess this just goes to show how we have NO IDEA the bumps in the road we'll encounter, and we must be flexible and adjust goals. The best part is, now with a more relaxed perspective on running and racing, I'm enjoying it even more than I did in high school I think. I don't know for sure... That was a long time ago.

I ran even splits for the first two miles - 45 points every 200, which was perfect. Then I started to slip. 46, 46, 47, 48... I started to think in my mind, "Gosh, I was under for the first two. I'm gonna lose it in the last mile," and I knew how painful that would be. I almost dropped out. I was so close to walking off the track. This is something that I battled in high school. There were hardly any races that went by that I did not think about dropping out of. Finally, in my junior year of high school, I dropped out of the mile at an invitational. I had been struggling with the emotional pressures I was putting on myself all season, and I just cracked. I was so determined to be THE BEST that once I began to realize I wasn't, I felt it wasn't worth it anymore. I worked so hard - I knew I deserved to be the best, and the fact that I just wasn't going to be was too much to bare.

After I dropped out of that first race, the mental struggles only worsened, and again I dropped out of the two mile at leagues. This season ended as a great disappointment, especially following that sophomore track season in which I P.R.ed in the mile at states with a 5:16, and in cross that fall my junior year I medaled at states at 12th place. The pressure just got to be too much.

Since I came to Bloom, I've definitely had races in which I seriously contemplated dropping out, but I was never doing well in those races. I wouldn't say I had a great race all throughout my college career until this past Saturday. The desire to drop out this Saturday was stronger than I remember feeling it for the past two and a half years. It was like I was back in high school again. My gosh - If I would have dropped out, to think how miserable I would have been! I mean, I ran a 19 minute 5K! I knew I was on that pace, and I knew if I held that pace I'd be elated, but I almost caved. I was an impulse away from giving in. An impulse away from accomplishing this time which will undoubtedly be an important stepping stone to greater performances. I just need to keep my head...

It was a great race, even aside from times. I had a good pack to work with for the first 13 laps. My original plan was to make a big move with 10 to go, but I made the move around 12 to go, and then I think that's why I started to hurt in that last mile. I have to take another look at my splits, but perhaps I got too eager.

I really do hope to qualify in the 3000 next week though at Cornell. I'd rather race that at PSACs.

The original plan was to run the 3000 at Bucknell this past weekend, but yet, another example of why flexibility is important. My grandmother passed away last week, and her memorial service was on Saturday at 11, which meant #1 I'd miss the 3000, and #2 I'd have to go to my Gram's service, and then try to race afterwards. I'm not going to pretend I was particularly close with her, but it was very emotionally draining nonetheless. Not only did I have to see my dad go through the loss of his second parent only 9 months after the loss of his father, but I also realized at the memorial service that, although my gram wasn't perfect and I didn't have much of a relationship with her, she did care more about me and the rest of my siblings and cousins than I realized before.

So, I was definitely feeling in a bit of a funk for the rest of the day. Glad I was able to shake it enough to race.

On to injuries....The tendinitis is no more, but as it is with me, when one thing stops hurting, something else starts. I tweaked my hip flexer badly somehow last week, perhaps when I slipped and fell on the ice on Monday morning's run. It feels AWFUL when I wake up in the morning, then it gets better as I go through my day. If I sit for more than 5 minutes, it hurts for my first few steps, then it's gone. But when it hurts, it hurts bad. I'm a little worried about this one. Stretch, heat, stretch, ice, stretch, stretch stretch.