Looking Ahead

I have to say, this year has not gone as I originally set out.  I wrote a whole long list of goals in the beginning of the year of which I've probably not achieved a single one (yet). In fact, I'm not even going to look at it right now.  What's the point?  I don't live in the past.  I learn from it.  I may have thought those were good goals to shoot for back in January but this has been a slightly crazy year for me and ... well, plans change.

So instead of looking in the past and what "should" or "could" have been, I've chosen to look to the future.  I have some pretty awesome things to look forward to!  I've been pretty lucky to have met some new and awesome people this year, which is part of what will make the rest of this year awesome!  (Have I said awesome enough?)

First, have you been watching the Olympics??  What the heck happened to the USA Men's gymnastics team!  And Japan contesting that score....what an upset for Great Britain!  What an upset for Russia and how amazing was that finish for USA in the Women's gymnastics finals!  Swimming: Lochte is hot, Phelps was sort of having a rough time until yesterday, Grevers proposed to his girlfriend (I LOVE THAT), Schmitt did awesome winning gold yesterday, etc...  These are by far my two favorite Summer Olympic sports!  And I'll confess, I'm a runner that doesn't watch much of the running/track events...NO! PLEASE DON'T STOP READING MY BLOG!

Another thing I have to look forward to is a half I signed up for in September, River Run Half Marathon.  I had said I was going to do this half for about 2 months now but I officially signed up.  It's in Cleveland, OH and a friend of mine posted about it in June.  I get tired of running races in Chicago sometimes and it's nice to change it up.  This half in Cleveland is the same day as the Chicago Half, September 9th.  I have several friends who live in Cleveland and thought..."Run a half, visit some friends!"  I initially mentioned it on my run group's facebook page to see if anyone would want to head there with me.  My friend Susan (who you might remember from running the Rockford Marathon, recap here) said she wanted to go with me.  A few other people contemplated it but are not for sure.  So, after signing up, I looked at the course and I think I will really enjoy this half.  It seems to be in a nice area, it's a point to point race (and we get bused to the start), and the elevation decreases from start to finish (a slightly downhill half??).  This half also fits in perfectly to my training schedule for the marathon.

Elevation Chart for the Half

Ohhhh, the marathon!  The most exciting thing for me to look forward to this year!  I was recently speaking with a "new" friend (someone I've known since 7th grade but recently started talking to on facebook...and had a crush on in 7th grade and was hugely humiliated at a dance by my friends involving him!)...um where was I???  Oh ok.  He said that since it's my 3rd marathon, I should do great because I will know what to expect.  Oh he's so naive! lol.  Little does he know every race ends up turning out completely different than the ones before and you have to expect the unexpected! 

But I'm really excited for the marathon.  Again, this training season isn't quite as I expected (have to remember the unexpected thing...) but I'm still confident that I can PR this one.  Now I'm just trying to formulate a plan to help me achieve this goal!  To be determined...

Another thing that I'm excited about?  I've improved my eating and it's showed on the scale as I've dropped 4 pounds!  I know you are not supposed to diet while training for a marathon, and I'm not dieting.  I'm just eating healthier (most of the time...no one's perfect) and trying to plan a little more.  I'm making sure I have plenty of healthy options at the house and at work.  I'm trying to plan my lunches a little more (still need to work on this). And I'm trying to plan my pre-workout snack better.  Eating healthy will definitely have a good impact on my running.  And starting today, I'm not drinking pop (again) anymore.  I stopped in the beginning of the year for about 4 months and then it started creeping back into my life.  All good changes to improve myself.

I'm also excited...I hope this isn't a secret...but a friend of mine started organizing a team for the Ragnar Relay next year of which I will be a part of!  Typically a team is 12 people each running 3 legs of varying distances from Madison to Chicago.  Our team is going to have 9 people each running 4 legs.  I'm super excited for this since I've wanted to do it for a couple years now!

What are you looking forward to?