So it's nearly that time. The Oasis Zoo Run is creeping up real quickly. Who's ready for it???? *shyly sneaks into a corner to hide*
No, I didn't fall completely off the bandwagon and quit my training plan alltogether. But no, I also didn't follow through and do what I said I would do and ensure that I was adequately trained for this one. Mind you, I have been doing lots of extra crosstraining in order to better strengthen and build my body, which has helped my running a lot (!!!), but it's not the same thing as actually training in running shoes.
Here's the scoop.
Over the summer, I worked three part time jobs (totalling 20 hours per week), volunteered in three different hospitals (totalling 20 hours per week), and took FOUR summer courses. People told me I was crazy. Maybe I was. But hey, I did it :) At the same time, I had planned a fabulous training program to prepare me for the zoo run in September, including building up my speed gradually and including hill and interval training, because the zoo run is fraught with hilly roads and extra challenges. It turns out that working/learning for 50-60 hours a week makes it really difficult to keep a rigid training schedule. And there were many, many times that I either had to cut runs short due to lack of time, or had to cancel them altogether. Long story short, I wasn't able to keep that program, and had to make a lot of alterations along the way. Boyfriend and I also signed up with a Groupon for a bootcamp at that time, and wanting to get the most out of it, started going 3-4 times per week. Great for getting exercise, not so great if you also need to get mileage in to train for a 10k.
Then a couple of months ago, I found out that I might not actually even be in town on the day of the zoo run. My dad is currently on a cross-Canada bike tour (he's volunteering, not riding, but still very cool), and their last day is in Halifax on the same day as the zoo run. He was really eager to get my mom and I out there to see them at the finish line and get a couple of days in Halifax while we were at it. Well. There went my zoo run. As much as I wanted to run the zoo, supporting my dad is way more important to me, obviously.
The plan was to fly out on the Thursday night or Friday morning. I didn't have my school schedule yet, so I had to wait to find out whether I'd even be able to go on that day or not, or at least if I did have a class on Friday, would I be able to leave early enough in the afternoon to make it worthwhile. Class schedules came out in mid-August. Wouldn't you know it --- I did get a class on Friday. And it ends at 3pm. And I have something due that day, so I can't even skip. Seriously? With the only available flight out leaving in the evening, it wouldn't be worth it for me to fly all the way there for only 24 hours in Halifax. Which means that I'll actually be home that weekend anyway and -- oh look! Now I'm back into the zoo run.
Oh right. All that running that I didn't do because I thought I wasn't going to be here. Hmm.
On the plus side, I had still been exercising A LOT thanks to that bootcamp. So it's not like I stopped exercise altogether and gave up, I have still been doing a lot of strength training and high intensity cardio work. Which is awesome, because in early September when I finally got myself together and started running more seriously again, I was able to pump out 5k with interval sprints and felt like I could have done more. A month earlier when I last tied up my running shoes, that wasn't possible. So, I'm feeling ok about it. I've since been doing longer distances and adding hills, and it hasn't killed me yet.
If this was the Yonge St 10k, I'd be feeling relatively confident at this point. But because it's not a nice downhill and/or flat course, I'm not. The thing about the zoo is that there are a LOAD OF CRAZY HILLS. And though I've been doing hill training over the last week to try to amp myself back up and get prepared for the epic hilly challenge ahead, I'm not so confident about this.
But you know what?
I'm doing it anyway.
Come hell or high water, I will run the zoo. If I have to crawl up the hills and roll my broken-down body across the finish line, I will do it. Because I made a commitment to myself many months ago when I signed up for this. I'm not expecting a personal best to come out of this (and I said that right from the get-go), but I am expecting that I will do the best that I can, and not bail out simply because I couldn't commit to the full training schedule that I had set.
I know that I haven't exactly been the most motivating running blogger out there. In fact, I've been a pretty craptastic exercise blogger. But I hope that if nothing else, the fact that I'm not just going to stop will motivate some of you out there to keep going. Even when it seems like there's no point in doing your event or continuing your training because you haven't been able to keep your commitment, you can still do the best that you can with the time and resources that you have available. Doing your best is all you can do. No one is expecting you to break a world record (unless you happen to be Usain Bolt or something, in which case, thanks for reading my blog :D!), so just do your best. And the most important thing is to enjoy it, because if you aren't enjoying it, then why do it at all??
No matter what the outcome, I will be posting my results of the zoo run here. Even if it takes three hours. Even if an escaped tiger attacks me along the way and mauls me to bits. You'll know about it.
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