So much for the hopes that the second stage would be cooler and less humid. At 5:30am when I got up, it already said it was at 100% and 25 degrees. Another hot one, just a bit shorter.
This stage took place in Cambridge, ON, about a 15 minute drive from where we were staying a ULW. It’s the only stage that doesn’t take place in Waterloo.
The second stage of the ENDURrun consisted of a 15km time trial.
Today was Stage 1 of the ENDURrun, and Mother Nature didn’t opt to make it an easy start. Yesterday in Waterloo, it was cool and rainy, and I was hoping that while the rain would die off, that the temperatures would stay. Well, that was not to be. The weather called for 25 degrees and 91% humidity, with thunderstorms later on in the day. The race was starting at 8:00am, so MAYBE it wouldn’t be that hot at that time.
The pre race meeting and packet pickup took place at the ENDURrun race director’s house. Lloyd Schmidt is the mastermind behind this unique running event. He and his family are the main volunteers and driving force behind the scenes.
Participating in a small home run race does have it’s advantages. Firstly, the race director knows your name! Lloyd walked over and gave me my race kit, which consisted of a reusable Saucony bag, in which was the technical race shirt, a forest green golf shirt (with ENDURrun logo), a Saucony water bottle, a map of Waterloo (only the out of town participants got a map; nice touch!
I’m here in beautiful Waterloo, ON, settling in to what will be my digs for the week. Everything has been pretty much right on schedule; got here around 1:30pm, checked into the residence, then we all went grocery shopping.
The weather here is cool and rainy. Tomorrow is supposed to be hot, with 91% humidity. Great. Nothing like Mother Nature to throw a wrench into things.
It’s a little surreal… hard to believe that tomorrow morning I’ll be starting this crazy adventure.
The ENDURrun starts tomorrow. Am I ready? Ready as I’ll ever be. I’m going through ups and downs; I think I’m ready, then I read something online or look at the course map and start to think “What the $#@% have I gotten myself into?”
I realized last night as I was packing my stuff, that I don’t really have a race plan. I mean, I’m doing the event for the experience, but I haven’t really thought about paces for each of the stages.
There’s a little over one week left before the ENDURrun, and I don’t feel at all ready. My running has suffered again over the last week; I either didn’t have time to fit it in, or the ones that I did fit in, sucked.
Yesterday I went out at lunchtime to do a 10km tempo, with two tough hills in it. It was rough; weather was humid, and I just didn’t have the gas to do that kind of aggressive running.
I am still high from Saturday morning’s 29km run. For me, it was one that reaffirmed things for me, that I have not lost my way, and still am on track in my training.
I broke it in two pieces; a 19km LSD run with Cheryl, and then a 10km progressively faster run, Cheryl accompanying me on bike. The first part was good; nice and slow and easy. The pace was about 30 seconds slower than what I’m supposed to be doing, but that’s okay.
I had a great hilly 10km run last night with my running partner, the kind of run that was tough, but not too tough. It reminded me of some of the reasons why I enjoy doing this as a sport. As I’ve posted, I’ve had some motivation problems with my current batch of training, and have sought the advice of my closest friends and family.
The advice I’ve gotten seems to fall into the following categories:
I’m having a hard time with the training this week. My slight injuries are almost nonexistent these days, and yet I just can’t seem to get myself motivated to train. I can barely get out of bed for work, never mind get up at 6am to go run a tempo. I’m in a funk, and need to get out before all the work I’ve done up to now is shot.
Here we are, some 43 days away from the ENDURrun, and I have only done a handful of meaningful training sessions. It’s been very difficult to get back into training mode after the Mississauga Marathon. I did the requisite 2 weeks of rest and recovery; it took that long for my legs to stop hurting. But I had lingering knee and foot issues, issues that still bother me today.
My knee was the one that worried me the most.