A Trying Treadmill Tuesday

Have you ever gotten out of bed at 4 AM, sighed heavily at the fact that the cold winter winds were literally rattling the windows of your 1930's farmhouse, and then bemoaned the fact that your house has no insulation so your house is almost as cold as the outside, thereby totally demotivating you to strip down into shorts and a t-shirt and scamper downstairs to do your treadmill speed workout?

You have?  Well, that was me this morning.  I'm glad I'm not the only one.

The speed workout sat there all innocent-like on my training schedule, saying I needed to run a 1200m at my 10K pace and then a 400m at my 5K pace, and then repeat that 2 more times.  My brain, however, was not acting so innocently; it was screaming "nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo" and covering its ears  to block it all out and make it go away.  The big baby.

I managed to work through the internal brain screaming and, after a quick breakfast, managed to get into my running shorts and a t-shirt in my house that was probably 50 degrees or so by that point.  This is when my dogs feel the need to bug me to go out, because they enjoy torturing me by making me stand by the front storm door wearing next to nothing.  The gleams in their little doggie eyeballs give it away that they are enjoying the fact that I'm freezing my ass off while they are forced to use the bathroom outside in the cold.  I try to explain to them that this is one of life's little injustices, but they just stare back at me, biding their time so they can poop in my shoe or tear up a valuable document I leave lying around.

I then made my way to the treadmill, whereby I realized that I forgot to put on my Garmin.  So, I trucked back upstairs to get it.  When I picked it up, I realized I left it on all night, and the battery was almost gone. (Does anyone else accidentally leave it on when you transfer your data?  I do.  I'm a moron.)  So, I quickly slapped it on the funky charging clip and then went back downstairs to get all my other treadmill equipment ready:

• A small bottle of gatorade
• A bottle of water
• A bondi band from one of my Ragnars
• A small hand towel for sweat and other bodily fluids that come from a face
• My foot pod for ye olde Garmin 
• The TV (getting it on and on a proper show that is good treadmill TV)

I went and got my Garmin (which had pretty speedily charged itself halfway by that time) and started up the treadmill, which is near a window that might as well have been open because so much wind was getting through it.  And I really really REALLY didn't want to do this workout.  It's not that I didn't want to run.

I just didn't want to do this workout.

If you regularly read what spills froth from my brain, you'll know I have this thing about running more than an 800m on the treadmill.  That thing is this:  I don't think I can do it.  Either I run too fast and have to take a break, or I just don't push myself enough to finish it once the pain starts setting in.

Bottom line, I have failed at these before, and I was afraid of failing again.

But then I told myself that I wouldn't accept that kind of stinkin' thinkin' out of my students, so I couldn't accept it out of myself.  I decided to do a mile warm-up and see how I felt.

Amazing how one mile can motivate you.

I ended up doing all of the repeats, and I made it all the way through the 1200s without stopping to rest.  However, there was a lot of mental abuse afoot whilst I was on that treadmill.  By the end of each one (and especially the last one), I was literally repeating over and over again in my head that suffering is optional suffering IS OPTIONAL YOU MORON JUST KEEP GOING YOU'RE ALMOST THERE.

Yeah.  Well, at least I didn't promise myself a new house this time.  I think I'll just save that one for long runs.  But I have to remember all of this pain and suffering is so I can fill the gaping chasm that exists in my PR list:

I wonder what it will be.  Until then, guess I'll have to keep talking myself into and beating myself up during workouts to find out.