the longest run of my life

Yesterday's long run was 12 miles, the first 10+ distance on the schedule and actually the first time in my life I had ever gone much past ten. I felt nervous about it during the week because the final mile of last weekend's seven-miler was a real struggle. I could not have lasted much longer. What would happen when I had to tack on an additional five miles?

As it turned out, besides being the longest run of my life, it was probably one of the best. For my route I decided to go from my front door to my parents' front door in Bay Village. My folks were planning on going to the West Side Market that day and could drop me back off on their way.

Beyond the distance itself, the morning featured some other firsts. I brought along a small granola bar with the expectation of enjoying a mid-workout snack, something I had never tried. I figured I should start getting acclimated to eating while I run since I will need the nourishment during the marathon. I unwrapped the bar just before my water break at seven miles (at the Remein house). Part of it may have been that I wasn't very hungry, but it felt very unnatural to try to chew and swallow food mid-run. I could only manage half before calling off the experiment.

I also decided this time out to listen to full albums on my iPod instead of leaving things up to shuffle mode. I chose the Black and White Album by the Hives and Coldplay's Viva La Vida, which both worked well despite being very different LPs.

Going with the full albums was mostly a good thing. As my marathon preparations have become more of a grind, it's been tougher to keep things fun. I think it helped yesterday to go through a couple of albums that I really enjoy. Instead of wondering what would come over my headphones next, I had specific songs and "album moments" to look forward to. The main disadvantage was that, as opposed to an endless expanse of shuffled tunes, records have a beginning, middle, and end. I always had some sense of how far along I was (and conversely, how far I had left to go), and there were a couple of times it was discouraging. The toughest part of the run may have been when the Hives finished up and I knew I had to keep running through another entire LP. So I may try this again, I may switch back to shuffling, we'll see. And yes, the fact that the workouts are so long that I am even making these decisions is frightening.

Other than what I've already written about, it seemed like a pretty standard run, just longer. Though I hadn't planned the timing out at all beforehand, I got to my parents' driveway just as the final strains of Death and All His Friends faded away. My destination, the distance (12 miles on the nose), and the conclusion of the music all met in one contented moment, and if I happened to let out a celebratory whoop, can you really blame me?