Work in progress

After 4 dark and dreary days, that were actually beautiful weather days, I have finally popped out of my funk. I was on the bridge spikes in hand weighed down with stones ready to throw them over the side and watch them drown, never to return. I had a lot of support from those around me urging me not to take the plunge but didn't want to hear it. That's my stubbornness getting the best of me, once I get an idea in my head no one can change it and I go full force ahead, whether it be good or bad. Deep in my heart I knew that I would be miserable but the stress of disappointment was just breaking me. I did in my despair reach out to a friend/teammate who is in the realm of sports psych to see if she could talk me down from the ledge and help me breakdown where mentally I went astray.

Out of nowhere just about an hour before I was going to break the news to my coach that I was stepping away, it hit me. I donated blood the Wed before. I wasn't really sure at that epiphany moment what that entailed but I set out to research. I started with the sites that went over what to expect after donation, nothing, the only thing they covered was not working out right after. I googled some more, then I found a few articles on what I was looking for. Bingo. Despite not many studies done on the entity, the science, math, and physiology were laid out in perfection. Basically your hemoglobin levels don't completely reset for at least 60 days, which in turn affects the level of iron your blood stores, which then affects how your body transports oxygen to the organs/muscles, which then affects performance. In a nut shell.

With that knowledge in hand I was able to take a step back and not throw my true love away with a single toss. A relief to myself and other supporters around me.

Twilight Zone

Today's meet is the first meet I've raced in almost a month. It's been a quiet time since all the colleges are finished up, the meets start to dwindle down around this time. There's a few select low key races series like this one hosted by New Balance, another post collegiate team. Though mainly geared towards middle distance runners the main/only races are the 800, 1500, and 5000, but they do feature one sprint race in the mix either a 400 or 200, in the series of 3 meets. Today I got to dabble my finesse in the 400. Since indoors ended I have switched my training group from the 800m to the 400m group. I haven't trained with this group since 07 when I first joined GBTC. Determined to battle back out the 8, I think I switched over to that group too suddenly, possibly causing me my "turmoil" in not reaching my goal times. So with this I have decided to work on pulling together my quarter speed which will hopefully enhance both the hurdles as well as the half. My main focus is the hurdles but since there a few meets that host intermediates I have to divert the focus to open races.

My training's been going really well and I was ready to see it come out in a race. Since I had run a 62 in indoor on no real speed work, I was confident that I could run faster with the change in training. Somewhere something's gone wrong. I got out nicely then at the 200 meter mark I just lost it. I'm simply baffled by this, and cannot understand, nothing translates. I'm starting to question whether I'm cut out to be a runner. I've put so much time and effort into my training that it's hard to not see any kind of progress. Very heartbreaking. This hit me hard.