They Called Out To Me, But I Was Strong

Okay, so you know how I'm reading that book, Running With God Across America, right? It's the one where I was stunned that the dude could eat a dinner of burritos and tacos the night before running 27.5 miles. Well, check out this little tid-bit ... after a day running 26.8 miles, for dinner that night, he ate pizza, a taco, a burrito, chocolate milk and a soda describing his indulgence as, "I downed enough food for a family of four."

To this point, he'd banked 352.8 miles in 12 days. This dinner was on the eve of running 56.8 miles the next day.

First of all, what do you even say besides, "WOW!"?? Reading such notations has been really interesting to me because it has made me flash back to things I thought (and, I know I'm not alone!) when I first started running. Namely, I remember thinking, "I can totally eat this because I ran so much today!" While there is never, ever a need to put down a distance of any length, there is a need to be realistic. So, even though my 2 or 3 mile outing felt like I'd gone at least 5, 6, 7, 8 ... miles (right ?!?!), it just wasn't true!

Once I felt settled with my running, I did start to think about my food intake both in terms of what kind of fuel was I eating and how much in that calories in/calories out way (stupid math). Only by being honest about what was going in and what was going out did I ever start to see true running progress in terms of making it easier and more fun. While I'm not perfect about, well, anything, the one thing I have learned through running is that it's a much easier effort when I'm just honest with myself about everything that plays into it. Sleep, mood, attitude, and, of course, food:

I bought these to have in the house because they're good, but
not totally-worth-it good. I will admit that I stood in the aisle
for a few minutes with a bag of peanut butter cups in my hand
trying to convince myself I could resist them when they got
home. But, I knew bringing them in the house was a fool's.
game. I'll play that game closer to my birthday and Christmas!
Yay! Planned mind games!

So, I'll keep reading about this guy and his crazy amount of running and all of the food that he needed to eat to sustain himself, and I'll hope I get a stomach ache just thinking about it. That's always a good deterent!!

Set yourself up for success in whatever you do today!! I'll see you after the morning run!