This past weekend we ran the inaugural Weymouth Woods 100K in Southern Pines which is about 5 miles from home. My friend Marie Lewis was the Race Director and she did an outstanding job. My training had not gone as well as I had hoped so I did not think I'd be able to run the whole race but would use it as a training run. By the day the race came I had decided to give it my best and complete the whole 62 miles. I was feeling great (that's a relative term of course) and staying positive until we got to the end of the 11th lap. I had 3 to go, each one about 4.5 miles, and I decided I just didn't have it in me and decided to drop. No fan fare, no explanation, I had decided I was done. I told myself that 50 was enough! 50 is good isn't it? At the time I thought it was the right decision and had promised not to second guess myself however, in the light of day, I have been questioning myself. It was certainly not a bad decision as it's wasn't my goal race however, a dnf is a dnf. Now I need to figure out how to keep that little voice that tells me it's okay to quit, to SHUT UP! I also think it has a lot of do with my fear of SUCCESS! Yes, not so much my fear of failure, although I'm sure that is part of it as well, but I think it's more the fear of success. Go figure!
I refuse to beat myself up (too much anyway, a little maybe) but I do want to learn from this and use it for my next event. I know I need to train more both physically as well as mentally. It was the first ultra I've done in almost 2 years except for New River 50K in October, where I bonked but finish. By the way, I'm waiting for pictures of the "lean"!
One of my goals for the new year was to get a little more selfish and I have to figure out how to do that. It's so hard for me to put my foot down and put myself first. I am working on doing that and hopefully will figure it out soon.
