Friday, March 16, 2007

You Know You're A Marathoner When. . .

~ Your "easy" runs top the weekly mileage of 95% of the general population.
~ You eat like a 400 lb. man, and look like you're starving. (I eat fairly healthy, but I eat constantly.)
~ You miss a run and you're irritable and pissy all day and evening, as well as the next day.
~ People avoid you when you're tapering.
~ Your friends gag when they catch a glimpse of your toes.
~ You roll your eyes when people talk about low carb diets.
~ "18 weeks" becomes your most important unit of time.
~ You start debating about Higdon.
~ You'd rather run a marathon than go on a "real" holiday.
~ You no longer think people who run marathons are crazy.
~ After finishing a really tough 26.2-mile run, your first thought is: "Next race, I'm going to...."
~ You have a pile of shoes in your closet because you feel like you have to have new running shoes every 500 miles.
~ Any run less than 16 miles feels like an easy workout. (Less than 10 for me.)
~ You spend too much time on the Internet reading about other peoples' workouts. (I'm addicted.)
~ You say you're going out for a short run and come back two hours later. (Maybe just one hour later.)
~ You think high 40s/low 50s and overcast sounds like perfect weather.
~ You think it's completely normal to put band-aids on your nipples.
~ When someone mentions that they live in another city, you immediately think, "Oh, I hear that's a good running city" or "Good God! I couldn't live there! Their marathon is cruddy and there's nowhere to run!"
~ You get up earlier on weekends than you do during the work week.
~ You try to negative split mowing your lawn.
~ You wonder if you can get your entire wardrobe made out of Coolmax.
~ Every time you see a runner when you're driving you feel like you too should be running, even if you ran 15 miles earlier in the day.
~ You tell your wife, husband, boyfriend, girlfriend that you want a marathon entry as a birthday present.
~ You think 40 miles is an easy week. (I'm getting to that point. Would like to increase base mileage to around there - right now I'm at about 30.)
~ When you're driving somewhere and you see a distance to next town sign and automatically calculate how long it would take to run there.
~ You plan your vacations around your training schedule. A trip to Colorado is an opportunity to get some great hill work in. You could never imagine going on a cruise or a small Caribbean island. Trying to map out a 20 miler would be too hard.
~ Actually thought about PowerGel as a dessert topping.
~ When someone asks you how far you are planning to run, you say "I'm ONLY doing 10 today".
~ When your non-running friends stop calling you to hang out the night before you do your long runs.
~ You start planning your training for the next marathon before you even finish the one you're training for now.
~ You wear more electronics on a run than are in the dash of your car. (I wish! GPS & HRM are on my wishlist!)
~ You are excited about an upcoming birthday because it will bump you up to a new age group and make it easier to get into Boston.
~ You tell non-runners you ran 5 miles when you really ran 15. Just so you won't have to sit through the "Wow, that's far!" conversation.
~ You gasp when you see someone running in everyday gym socks.
~ Your best watch is a Timex.
~ Your car smells a little sweaty from your running shoes in the back seat.
~ Your tan line is just above your ankles.

(I saw this on another blog - loved it - deleted those that I didn't relate to in anyway.)

Fun Stuff !

11 comments:

  1. i see that you might do Peterson Ridge Rumble in Sisters in '08. Why not this year? It is a great race. Sean does a great job. Great food and beverage after and you can even take a shower after this great trail run at the middle school. Luxury at it's best I tell ya.

    There is a list like you made for ultra runners also... good stuff.
    tom riley

    ReplyDelete
  2. Originally, I had planned to run it this year but then I broke my wrist and thus, my training plan has changed... Peterson Ridge is a few weeks before the Eugene half and my mileage just won't be up there.

    ReplyDelete
  3. There is a great bunch of ultra's here in Oregon. Some 50k's (that's only a little longer than a marathon at 31.1 miles or so) But a lot of times there will be a shorter trail run within that race if you want to give it a try.

    Check out Oregon Trail Series.

    http://www.oregontrailseries.org/

    coming up in July is S.O.B. in Ashland. It is at Mt. Ashland ski resort. One of the most beautiful courses in the Series. It has a 15k option.

    McKenzie River 50k fills up the very first day of registration, another beautiful course.

    Waldo just rocks. It is the Masters USATF 100k Championship this year. Some of the big guns will be there I am sure.

    Hope to some day see you on the trails. Just a lot of fun and great people.
    tom

    ReplyDelete
  4. After reading this post I realized something... I need to get a life. ;) I identified w/ almost all of the points except one. I'm like you in that I don't have a HRM or a Garmin/GPS device. I map my runs using Google Earth, and I train using rate of perceived exertion. Someday I'll get a Garmin. But not before I get a home gym!

    ReplyDelete
  5. "You roll your eyes when people talk about low carb diets." LOL
    Love it - i live on carbs!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Haven't done a marathon yet, but still can identify with some of them.
    Pac Crest is a great tri, but hard for a first one. The Deshutes dash is a good first, but is late in the year.

    ReplyDelete
  7. OK you did again -- I slept thru my alarm this morning (a now regular yet annoying occurence) but seeing your post made me want to run. So I swear, I'm logging off and going for a run! Thanks for the inspiration!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Hi Makita, I posted an answer to your question regarding CrossFit on my blog. I didn't want to leave a long winded answer here. Stop by when you get a chance. :)

    ReplyDelete
  9. I saw it somewhere too - or something similar. The one item I missed here was "when you dream about running." I hadn't so far, but I did promptly in one of the next nights.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Hey makita, by all means take it easy on your wrist! If you wanna do Crossfit in the meantime, definitely focus on the squats, walking lunges and anything else you can do that doesn't require the use of that arm. I hope it heals well!

    ReplyDelete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.