Motivation

4am alarms, 5am alarms. How the hell do I drag myself out of bed every morning? Last Saturday morning in the pre-dawn hour after about 7 miles into my trail run and in a dreamy state thinking about running in the Utah mountains, I managed to surprise a skunk on the trail. I came within 1 or 2 feet of him before I let out a guttural scream. I jumped to the left into Bull Nettle as he kept turning his butt towards me and, yes!, he sprayed but missed me, miraculously. The stinging of my legs from the nettle was a welcome consolation to what could have resulted.

Due to what Olga has seen with my workout results, the bar has been raised a little higher to ensure optimization of my training. I’ve been doing morning and evening workouts every day this week and will have eight sessions finished by tomorrow evening. Then, I get to rest for almost 48 hours before I run in a 60k night trail race, which is just a bump in an, otherwise, full training schedule. I get to sleep in on Sunday morning and then back at it, again, on Monday with the next “Off” day not occurring until August 30th—22 workouts later. Afterwards, there will be two more weeks of push with another 60k thrown in the middle before beginning the taper for Bear. Right now, I am taking it one day at a time because looking at the training schedule as a whole is too much to mentally acknowledge. The one constant reminder, however, is all the training and preparation in the world still doesn’t guarantee the desired outcome at a goal race. And, that is a humbling thought.

It’s interesting how the most difficult part of a morning workout is willing myself to somehow get out of a warm bed and make it out the door. It would easier to just turn off the alarm and go back to sleep for a few more hours. I believe most of us have felt that way and I experience it more that I will openly admit. But, the accomplishment of another completed workout erases any hesitancy I had when the alarm initially sounded. The same goes for those evening workouts when I’d rather unwind from the work day or just sit on the couch. Finding the motivation when one knows the workout calls for speed, tempo, or hill work can be difficult. It never seems to get any easier. I think that is why I must have distinct goals so I can relate what I’m doing now with a predetermined future point in time. Otherwise, I would probably opt for the couch.