Race week is upon me. I have been thinking about this and planning/training for it for a long while (ever since I wisely passed on running the scorching Sauvie Island half in June). I am feeling very ready for it and anticipated no problems, that is until I rolled my ankle this morning ARRRG! It is actually not too bad and I have four days to RICE it (Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation). I am sure it will be fine, but still a little scary.
It is sort of funny, I have been stewing about several running methods for pre-race preparation such as carbo-loading, hydro-loading and tapering. While I still will be able to eat a bunch of pasta this week, I won’t be able to try out any of the extensive plans. One entailed going for a log exhaustive run a week before the race (a date I missed 2 days ago), then spending the next 3 days eating only 10% carbs in your diet, then finishing up the final 3 days at 85% carbs. This apparently builds up huge stores of energy in your body though people really complaign about the depletion stage in terms of how they feel. There are lesser ideas as well, which is probably what I will end up doing. Basically eat a large amount of carbs the days before the rave and have a heavy carb breakfast such as a bagel, banana or energy bar. I’ll probably go the bar route. I am also planning on using 2-3 gels on teh run, so that will help as well
Hydro loading sounds interesting too. Basically you load up on water the day before. One issue with it is you can actually over do it and get water poisoning or hyperhydration. It sounds like a really weird thing to happen when you are struggling to get hydrated, but I apparently you can overdue it. I think I will stick to my normal hydration rigor, which basically comes down to drink water when thirsty and pack water on my runs. One tip I read fro training and drinking water, is force yourself to drink a little every mile as this both keeps you hydrated and matches the distance between aid stations.
Tapering is probably the easiest sounding of all pre-race preparations. As you are training for a long race you find yourself in a mileage routine. Tapering basically reduces your miles before a race to allow you to rest your muscles and build up energy in your system. There are tons of tapering routines. The one I am going to follow says, roll your ankle four days before the race, stop running and hope it feels good enough to run! My pre-roll plan was to run my full distance Monday (which I ended up sleeping in on) then do a 2-3 4 mile runs during the week before the race. I figured I would not run at all in Seattle on Fri and Sat. So my plan now is to possibly run a short run Thursday and call it good.
On to Seattle!