What Gets You Outside?

Yep, the start of August….

At one time in my life today meant hitting the highway, and heading to Grande Cache for one of my fave events of all….the Canadian Death Race……I haven’t been up there since 2008….but driving into that mountain town was like coming home…..much like Jasper Alberta, or Vancouver BC, it just always seems like where I’m supposed to be, where I was meant to be…on top of mountains.

Today was…..was supposed to be going long-er than usual, but well, I began with no motivation….

After a lot of coffee (yeah I know, I know, I’m still trying to quit) and lots of paper work, yep, working on the fun run, watching the news……I finally got my butt out the door.

Lately, just stepping out the front door was good enough…but today a trick I use….drive somewhere, and well, you’re there, so you might as well run….

Made up a new route..not a direction I’ve run often, and then I improvised…..yep, I took one wrong turn and well went around in a circle…..and I found a nice collection of moquitoes…lots of them

but my kind of run, and once you start, you wonder why you took so long to begin.

Some days, there’s always that feeling…..someone may see me?…..I think more than a few runners…that self consciousness….for me anyway…I don’t have a lot of self confidence, which is weird right? I’ve only been at this for almost 30 years….but it’s there…..

I think the trick is to just start….and for me, not to have a set plan….because for me anyway, that always changes….yes I train, but I run to have fun, to relax, to enjoy myself….sure, races and runs are a goal, like Death Race….but, secret, I’m almost always undertrained…..weirder even..my first attempt at an Ironman Triathlon…I was focused……not really stuck to a schedule, but seemed to always be training….there was a lot of it…and I sucked on race day….my training crew could not believe it, I trained as hard or harder than anyone of them…..the following year, I training, but just enjoyed the training, and I did well…I finished.