Happy Thanksgiving everyone!  I hope some of you were able to get out and get moving before stuffing your faces 🙂  This whole idea of running a half-marathon on Thanksgiving morning is relatively new to me, but I don’t see myself doing it any differently in the years to come.  It just takes a few hours of my time and my husband and I still manage to get a delicious dinner on the table.  I definitely like the idea of being able to eat what I want with little worry.

As I reflect back on my childhood holidays, I have difficulty remembering my mother ever cooking a turkey.  It wouldn’t surprise me if she never took on the challenge.  She was far from domestic.  I know that she would rather have been running than cooking.  As I find myself in the kitchen, I realize that I am really not that great at whipping up these holiday feasts.  My mother did not teach me how to bake an apple pie.  I learned that when I lived for 4 months in the Bahamas while studying sharks (sounds silly, I know).  If it weren’t for my step-mother, my poor husband would be forced to eat frozen dinners and take on a majority of the housework.  My step-mother is the queen of domestic.  She actually thrives on cooking and cleaning.  She can’t go a day without grabbing the bottle of bleach.  So, I guess I managed to get the best of both worlds.

Therefore, when it comes to family traditions, nothing really stands out pre-step-mother era.  I am not one of those daughters who whips out the recipe passed down to her from her mother who acquired it from her mother.  I don’t have those memories of smelling my mother’s apple pie as it bakes in the oven or helping her frost the cookies.  Yeah, sometimes I get a tad jealous when I hear of my friends talking about their mothers in this way.  I hope they are thankful that they still get to spend holidays with their mothers.

Yet, what I do have that most don’t, is the passion to run.  That is what my mother passed on to me.  It makes these Thanksgiving 1/2 marathons all the more special… similar to the feeling of nostalgia you get when baking that apple pie from your mother’s recipe.   Not only that, but I have my own daughters now and I can pass along the family traditions that I think are worthy.  Just yesterday, my oldest helped me make a pumpkin pie.  Next year I will show her how to make “my” awesome apple pie.  And why not get in a good turkey trot?

Right at this moment, my husband is participating in his first Ironman Triathlon.  For those of you who aren’t familiar with those, it basically involves swimming 2.4 miles, biking 112 miles and then running 26.2 miles.  Sounds crazy, right?  I used to think so, but now I am not so sure.  Would I be willing to do it?  Definitely not right now, but who knows what the future holds.  Until this moment, I didn’t realize how much dedication it takes to endure a full day of strenuous activity.  As I repeatedly search online for status updates regarding my husband, I can’t help but think “this is taking all day” and I don’t mean that in a negative way but in the “wow, incredible” way.   It takes a lot of passion for someone to have that type of self-discipline.  Today I ran 12 miles and that only took 1/8 of the time it is taking my husband to complete this race.  He is covering 140.6 miles!

I always knew that my husband was the athletic type.  If you have been reading my blogs, then you know that I have been the inconsistent athlete.  When I met my husband he actually received the “most athletic” award for our group in the military.  He often talked about the workouts he endured during his college years.  I can’t believe that I even attempted to run with him when I “liked” him back in the day.  I had issues when I was in the military because I couldn’t do the stupid sit and reach portion of the fitness test.  Seriously, a runner doesn’t need to be flexible… thank goodness I know that now.

After we got married, my husband was kind of like me when it came to fitness… up and down.  I think he liked to blame the kids even though he wasn’t the one who had to get pregnant, gain weight and then lose it!  He would often commit to a race of some sort and then complain that he wasn’t ready… yet, he would easily overcome the challenge.  It actually made me sick.  He would barely train while I would attempt consistency and fail miserably.  Now I can FINALLY say that I am able to WHOOP him when it comes to running.  However, he TOTALLY has me beat with this Ironman stuff.  Get me on a bike and I will show you the best way to fall off.

Anyway, even though he doesn’t always think so, he has that passion within and I know that it will always be there.  I admire him for that and I am so thankful I married someone who could motivate me.  I did kind of inherit that competitive nature from him (okay, some of that was already in there… but it has definitely been compounded by my intent to beat my husband at every race).  Now I have all of this passion brimming at my fingertips and I am wondering how I can best use it to help others.  Even though I am usually cursing at myself by mile 8, it just feels so good to be running.  And I am so PROUD of my husband for doing something that I can’t even imagine doing right now!

When you are used to doing things a certain way, it is often difficult to change.  Throughout my coaching experience over the past 5 months, I have learned that being able to adapt is a necessary characteristic of being a coach.  It took a bit of time for me to realize that the run was not about me and my goals.  It was about someone else and their goals.  You would think that a teacher should have realized that from the beginning, but it took some time for the realization to hit.  Even up until the end, it was still difficult to make the transition.  I would often increase my pace without thinking, forget about the constant hydration reminders or continue past the bathrooms without allowing for a pit stop.  Maybe I just liked dispelling cruel and unusual punishment… but most likely it was because I would fall back into “my” zone.

I must admit, that even when it came to event day, I was kind of disappointed that I would not be running the 13.1 mile course just like everyone else.  I was assigned to reside in between mile 9 and mile 12.5.  As we walked to mile 9 and placed ourselves along the course, it seemed very odd to be standing there wearing a race bib as the elite runners whizzed past.  As the course grew thick with runners, I felt a sudden urge to jump into the crowd.  Yet, I stood my ground.  I was waiting for our first team member.  I knew he would be there soon because he was our fastest runner.  It didn’t take long before I spotted him in the crowd.  That was my chance, so I jumped in and started asking all of the coach-like questions.  “How are you doing?”  “Have you been staying hydrated?”  “Did you take some nutrition?”  “How is that leg feeling right now?.”  I wasn’t sure what else to do after I asked all of the questions, so I just stayed by his side and every now and then I would offer some words of encouragement.  Then it was time for me to let him go and run back to find our next team member.  At that point, I was feeling good and I just ignored the people who tried to tell me I was going the wrong way.  Not like the large letters on my shirt spelling out the word “COACH” had anything to do with my unusual running behavior.

Then I spotted our next runner who was running with the other coach.  I joined them for a bit until I decided to jump back out onto the sidelines and run back for the next participant.  He wasn’t too much farther back.  He seemed so peppy and cheery that I wondered if he had really just run 11 miles.  I asked my usual questions, but felt no wave of concern.  He was motivated to get it done.  He had a personal connection to cancer and it was his motivation to make it to the end.  I had no doubts when I left him on his own at mile 12.5.  He was strong and determined.

I went backwards, yet again, and was once again told that I was going the wrong way.  That only motivated me to run faster in the “wrong” direction.  And that wasn’t easy because the wrong direction usually involved running through the grass and over slopes and rocks (since I obviously wasn’t about to run head on into a crowd of determined runners).  Fortunately, it didn’t take long before I saw her.  Another team member who had come so far over the past 5 months.  She was one of our most dedicated trainees.  As I ran alongside her, it appeared she was her usual cheerful self.  It didn’t even appear as though she was breaking a sweat!

Once again, I turned around at the mile 12.5 mark and ran back.  As I ran through the grass along the course I noticed a participant who looked tired and worn out.  She was not a member of our Jax team, but I called out her name (written right on her shirt) and ran alongside of her.  When I asked her how she was doing she started crying.  I asked her why she was running the race tonight and she told me it was for her grandmother.  All I could do was tell her that her grandmother was watching over her and that she must be so proud to see her granddaughter finishing her first half marathon.  Then she stopped crying and started smiling as I offered up some more encouragement and cracked a few jokes to lighten the mood.  By the time I left her at mile 12.5 she was stronger than ever.  At that moment, I finally realized why I was there.  I got back to work right away.

Before I knew it, the sweeper was in sight and it was time for the coaches to head to the finish line.  Even though we had been on our feet for over 5 hours, we were so full of life as we finally danced our way across the finish line.  I never thought that I could be so happy to come in last place.   I think I accomplished something great that night.  I finally learned to run like a coach.

I know that on occasion I have highlighted my running background to include why and when I started running and who inspired me to run (my mother of course!).  I will add that my running in the past has been very sporadic and I almost always focused on a goal, achieved the goal and then stopped running once the goal was met.  I think that happens to a lot of people.  They master that 5K or half-marathon and then feel that they have had enough with the running and move on to something new (or revert back to channel surfing).  It takes passion and dedication in order to continue running because it is not always exciting and pleasant.

I guess you can say that I finally broke through the mold and decided that I hadn’t had enough when it came to running.  A year ago, I had just given birth to my third angel and I was wondering what I was going to do to lose the nasty baby weight hanging off my mid-section.  After each previous pregnancy (well, not right away with the first), I had found that running worked to get me back to a normal size.  I also found out during those times that I couldn’t just go out and run without a goal in mind.  After having my first child, I set my mind on the Napa to Sonoma Half Marathon.  That was my first half marathon and I was so proud of myself for finishing it in a decent amount of time.  After that I ran a few smaller races, but I stopped pushing myself when it came to running.  Then, I decided to run a marathon with Team in Training.  Well, that training lasted about two months until I found out I was pregnant with number two.  I felt that I hadn’t yet built enough of a running base to continue safely.  However, four weeks after giving birth I got on that treadmill and started again.  That time I worked towards another half marathon and I finished the San Jose Rock n Roll a few months later. Once again, my running became sporadic and I did the occasional short distance race.  What do you think happened next? Right, I got pregnant again.

I know that was a long story about my uphill and downhill battle with running.  However, I know that I am not the only one that this has happened to.  Yet, I can finally say that I am out of that rut.  I feel like I can finally call myself a runner and I have become a consistent one too.  During this past year, I have not gone longer than a week without running (I rarely go longer than 3 days).  Sure, I had goals, like the marathon I completed as part of Team in Training.  However, there was a stagnant period where I wasn’t really training for anything and I still just kept running for the sheer pleasure of doing it.  Then I became a coach and now I kind of have to run, but I am more than okay with whatever I can do to keep myself running.  Of course I now have new goals that are even crazier than the first ones.  I never imagined that I would keep pushing myself harder to improve my running more and more each day.  Sure, I don’t always want to wake up at 4:00 am to go run 14 long miles or get on the treadmill so I can drag out those 6 miles, but I do it anyway.  Afterwards I feel great and I am thankful that I have a passion that I can pursue.  I can’t picture myself stopping now…