In awe

I finally weighed myself and I broke the scale –figuratively. Haha! I’m way heavier than I thought. It must be all the pizzas I stuffed myself at the end of the race and I have been so hungry all the time. I gained 12 pounds from my average weight (now at 172 lbs/ 78kg). Oh my.  I weighed several times to be sure what I was seeing was true. No wonder I feel like a tank or a 800 lbs gorilla.

Luckily I came across a posting on Marathon Maniacs, and fellow runners chimed in that 10 lbs gain after a marathon is not unusual. It is water pooling in the legs. They recommend wearing compression socks and weight would normally disappear after a week. I weighed myself again today, and it already gone back down 5lbs.

What’s new in my life? I was accepted into the Marathon Maniacs club after my last race. It was a plus to able to run three marathons in three months (90 days). Those people are really maniacs, they run a marathon every weekend. I will be one of them! The more you run, the higher standing you are in the club. Right now, I’m in the lowest rung. The next level for me is to do 6 marathons in six months (haha, it will take me awhile to get there). 

What is my goal? At the very beginning it was to run fast. I don’t want to finish at the bottom of my age group. I know time doesn’t matter, but still who wouldn’t want to run faster? Now it is exploring and stepping out of my comfort zone. I know now marathon is easy (relatively). I want the extra challenge. Why not add some miles? I would try triathlon too, throw in swimming and biking, but I’m a wimp at the moment to take on swimming.

Why am I doing this? Running is something, I don’t have to worry about and it doesn’t stress me out like work. Unlike in the past, when either I would work very late or I get home too early and just chill, now all I think about is to run.

I go into work, and before long, it is another week and another race coming up. The week just passes by.

With running, I have remade myself and my circle of friends the last two years. I don’t have many friends to begin with, but now with running, I’m part of a new world of friends. Running is a solitary sport but the supports I get from those around are great. I am part of several running clubs and with each race, I am extending my circle of friends with new people I met on the course. Also I started writing on here…and gaining readers and I am making friends with people I never would have met in real life!

Life starts on the weekend for me and I am drunk on running.

The whole past week, I have been in planning mode. Where can I run next. Planning for a race is really hard work!

Last night I checked on 100 miler/100k events to do after the 50 miler. The one that caught my attention is the Blackbeard Revenge at Outer Banks, North Carolina. The race starts in Haterra and ends in Corrolla. It is completely flat except for bridge crossings. Race starts at 4am and ends the following day in the afternoon 30-34 hours? There are aid stations at every 5 miles. 4 or 6 bag drops. I think it is doable. The price is reasonable too 

I have been thinking of building a crew/pacer. I think I could do Blackbeard alone, but it would be good to have a pacer. For me building a crew is hard because I am not good at convincing people to give up a weekend to be out in the element to wait on you unless they are your family. Finding one or two pacers is even harder. They don’t get any award for running 25/50+ miles. They have to carry their own food and stuff (not sure if they can use bagdrop). (Most races prevent a pacer from muling (carrying your stuffs) for you, and I think that is fair.) They train just as hard as you do. There are races where the pacer has to pay to enter. I guess I have to make more friends who run Ultras. I think Blackbeard, pacers are free to run.

Day 45 end