Am I Going to Make It Next Saturday?

Short answer is: I Don't Know! My well-laid plans to stop being lazy and "too busy" to run have come to naught thanks to Mother Nature and poor schedules. I had initially wanted to get out and run on Monday morning, however, it was pouring, literally pouring, down rain at 5:45 AM, which killed my motivation. I want to run, but there's no sense in running in rain at 38 degrees. Then I thought maybe Tuesday morning would work. However, getting to bed too late the night before killed me. Wednesday was another rainy morning so here we are, about 9 days from the Celtic Solstice 5 Miler and I haven't run since before Thanksgiving.

Am I going to make it next Saturday? I don't know but the weather looks to be good and cold so I'm going to go and get my $15 worth. It's a great race and I'm not going to let the craziness of the last two weeks sabotage my enjoyment of the race. I've got about 5 running opportunities between now and the 19th (tomorrow, Saturday, Monday, Wednesday and next Friday) so maybe if I can hit those targets, I'll be able to slowly meander along the 5 mile course and not flame out.

Or, I could run those five days and still limp across the finish line on the 19th heaving from embarrassment, not to mention exhaustion. We'll see how it goes, but as the end of the year approaches, a year where I seriously fell off the running wagon, I know I need to set some 2010 goals and map out how I'm going to get there. I think spending the first 6-8 months getting my mileage back above 10 miles, followed by a fall half marathon target and then late fall-winter races culminating in the 2010 Celtic Solstice is a good starting point. Finding new ways to stay motivated, however, is the big challenge and will probably be a determining factor next year.

For now, I just want to be able to run that 5 miler next weekend and then head to my grandmother's house in the afternoon for our pre-holiday feast!