{"id":225,"date":"2013-03-25T01:27:52","date_gmt":"2013-03-25T01:27:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/?p=225"},"modified":"2013-03-25T01:27:52","modified_gmt":"2013-03-25T01:27:52","slug":"18-miles-in-a-blizzard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/?p=225","title":{"rendered":"18 Miles in a Blizzard"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s official.\u00a0 I\u2019m crazy.\u00a0 I mean like certifiably insane crazy.\u00a0 I just ran 18 miles in the snow.\u00a0 For anyone reading this outside the Greater St. Louis area, I might need to clarify what I mean by snow.\u00a0 It\u2019s March 24th<\/sup>, right?\u00a0 And we are having the blizzard of the year! \u00a0I\u2019m quite sure we are breaking records with this. For a place that claims that they don\u2019t need to be prepared because they never get snow (which is ridiculously incorrect), we are in the midst of an estimated foot of snow. \u00a0It started at about 6 am today and is expected to continue until 6 am tomorrow.\u00a0 School has already been cancelled. \u00a0Is that even possible with April a week away?\u00a0 I guess so because we are having our own 2013 version of Snow-mageddon.<\/p>\n

So, if you happened to be out today, and saw any of the 25 people crazy enough to be out running in this mess, I was one of them.\u00a0 At least 20 of the others are all friends of mine.\u00a0 I\u2019m glad to know I\u2019m in good company in my craziness.<\/p>\n

As weird as this will sound, I needed to get out there today.\u00a0 Aside from the fact that I needed to do a long run for training purposes, I was feeling pulled in a million different directions this morning.\u00a0 Emails, texts, phone calls\u2026it seemed like everyone needed something from me and they all wanted it right at that moment. \u00a0I just didn\u2019t have it in me to take care of everyone else\u2019s requests. \u00a0I have a tendancy to allow myself and my feelings to get buried under the expectations of others, so I know when I start feeling buried, that\u2019s when I need to take care of Lindsey.\u00a0 I put away the laptop and tucked the phone into my spybelt (I didn\u2019t plan to check it during my run, but in light of the weather, I figured it was best to have it with me).\u00a0 I strapped on the Yaktrax and I set off into the blizzard.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not gonna lie, that was a tough run, both physically and mentally.\u00a0 I typically have some kind of weird mental block on 18 milers.\u00a0 20\u2019s I can whip out without a problem and even anything up to 16-17 isn\u2019t too bad.\u00a0 But I hate 18 miles.\u00a0 I absolutely loathe that distance.\u00a0 Today I set out with 18 in the back of my mind knowing that I should<\/i> go that far, but not really sure if it would complete it.\u00a0 I think I got so focused on beating the snow, that I actually forgot how much I hate 18 miles.\u00a0 I finished in around 3 hours.\u00a0 I\u2019ve run 20 and 21 milers faster than that.\u00a0 One of those 20 milers even involved rain, sleet and crazy wind.\u00a0 Oddly, it was exactly 2 years ago today, if I remember correctly, when I was training for the Nashville full that never came to fuition.<\/p>\n

The first 10 miles today were great.\u00a0 It was actually quite beautiful running out Old Manchester, all snow covered and lovely.\u00a0 The snow plows were being very considerate and trying not to attack me.\u00a0 Mile 11 was tough, I started to curse running.\u00a0 Mile 13 was great, I thought I would probably make it.\u00a0 Mile 16 was hard, and slow, and painful and reeked of gasoline from snow blowers.\u00a0 I finished Mile 17 right next to my street. \u00a0I could see my house, my nice warm comfy house. \u00a0I wanted to stop. \u00a0I wanted to say \u201cWell, that\u2019s a wrap, time to get warm and dry\u201d. \u00a0It would have been so easy to just call it a day.\u00a0 17 miles in a blizzard, that\u2019s plenty, right?\u00a0 But those are the moments that truly test our character.\u00a0 What do we do when things are hard?\u00a0 When we\u2019re tired and weary, do we quit? Cheat? Give up?\u00a0 Or do we push through the cold and the tired and the soaking wet shoes to press on towards the goal?\u00a0 Do we fight through the pain to accomplish what we set out to do?\u00a0 There is a reason I always wear a bracelet on my left wrist\u00a0that simply reads \u201cPersevere\u201d.\u00a0 It reminds me that I can, and I will, in any situation.<\/p>\n

At approximately 17.36 miles, a man in his driveway stopped shoveling for a moment and watched me as I passed.\u00a0 I paused my music long enough to hear him say, \u201cNow that\u2019s dedication\u201d.\u00a0 Smiling, I responded, \u201cMarathon training doesn\u2019t stop for the snow!\u201d\u00a0 He smiled.<\/p>\n

Seriously, marathon training doesn\u2019t <\/i>stop for the snow.\u00a0 Life<\/b> doesn\u2019t stop for the snow.\u00a0 Sure it slows down and school gets cancelled, but it doesn\u2019t stop.\u00a0 And neither should we.\u00a0 Sometimes it\u2019s a long, lonely, snowy, slushy, challenging road, but every once in a while, when you need it most, someone shows up with a word of encouragement and a smile that will pull you through that last half mile.<\/p>\n

Now who wants to come over and shovel the foot of snow in my driveway so I don\u2019t have to?\u00a0 Any takers?\u00a0 Anyone\u2026?<\/p>\n

\"View<\/a>

View of the blizzard from my porch. No doubt it’s beautiful. But brutal to run in.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s official.\u00a0 I\u2019m crazy.\u00a0 I mean like certifiably insane crazy.\u00a0 I just ran 18 miles in the snow.\u00a0 For anyone reading this outside the Greater St. Louis area, I might need to clarify what I mean by snow.\u00a0 It\u2019s March 24th, right?\u00a0 And we are having the blizzard of the year! \u00a0I\u2019m quite sure we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[9,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-aside","hentry","category-lessonsfromrunning","category-uncategorized","post_format-post-format-aside"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4eO4v-3D","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=225"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":227,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions\/227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}