Fiddling around waiting...

It's a good thing that I've been so busy this past week and didn't even have 2 seconds to worry and fidget about every little detail, aches and pains, etc for the big day on Monday; you know the Boston thing... or I'd be driving my poor wife crazy with all my fidgeting and fiddling around.

Actually, while away it was always at the back of my mind and I did stress over whether people were sick, what I was eating, getting the scheduled easy runs in despite being up to midnight and then up before 6am each day preparing for the meetings. The drive back yesterday was nice and relaxing with my co-worker Otto, who makes interesting conversation with all the places he's seen and experienced in his world travels. But then when we arrived in the office to dump our stuff, check email and do travel forms, I crashed and just felt totally exhausted and drained. I think the stress and strain from the week finally caught up with me, now that the 'bad-news' meetings were behind and I no longer needed to be 'on my A-game'. So I canned the scheduled short run after work and just had a beer, relaxed on the couch after a normal meal, tried to catch up on my blog reading and of course... some ice-cream for a snack!

Slept in till 8:30 this morning for 9.5 hours of well needed sleep but still feeling lethargic today. After a few coffees and a light breakfast it was off for an easy 5 mile run. It was a slow, slow, tired run, feet were sore from all the concrete sidewalks in Halifax/Dartmouth, and it was a struggle for a run I'd expect to do in my sleep! Damn! You'd think that I'd just be floating along at an effort level of 1/10 at this point with the taper in miles from the 70-80 range to only 27 this week!! All I can point to is the lack of sleep and being stressed out with work and all I can do is take it easy for the next few days and charge up the mental batteries as well as the physical ones.

Still don't have my race number pickup packet and it looks like most of the international runners, especially Canadians are in the same boat. The BAA sent me an email in this regard last week and unless it shows up early Sat before I hit the road, there will be a long lineup to get new pickup cards at the expo. However, I did have time on my short ugly run to stop at work and print off my race booklet as well as my own personalized unoffical version of my race number. Here for your viewing pleasure is what I will look like on race day. Except that I won't be standing still and the race number won't say 'Go Mike' ;-) Do you think the fans will know what country to cheer for? The Boston marathon fans are the absolute best!!
The travel plans are now settled and I'll be travelling down tomorrow with some friends from Saint John who are doing Boston as well. The New Brunswick contingent is the largest ever this year at 60 participants. The RunNB website has the list by bib number and also has some fun with predicting the top ten runners. Not to blow my own horn, but I was given an honorable mention last years picks and ended up being #1o for NB'ers in 2005 ;-) This year I didn't make the cut but intend to do as well or better because my training has been the most intensive ever for this race.

Which brings to mind my race goals; which aren't totally clear yet in my own mind. First and foremost is to finish with a smile or at least a grimace of a smile. Second is to meter out the effort over the whole course, taking it easy in the 1st half and trying for even and possibly a negative split, and feeling at the end that I'd given it every thing possible at the end of the day. Third are my time and place goals. I think I'm trained for a 3:15 or better which would be a PB and might surprise myself with the base of mileage that's in the bank. The weather is supposed to be ideal with cool overcast conditions and only light north winds so the time thing might happen. Placement wise, I'd like to shoot for top 7% overall, and top 7% in my age group but that's just because it's my favorite number lately.

That's it for this week's running. Total of only 27 miles, YTD 1011, 2 days 20 hrs and counting... I will have internet access in Boston and hope to do a couple more posts before and after the race [twitch].