26.2 miles. A full marathon. During my training, I’ve got to run a whole one. It’s a ridiculous distance for my relatively weak mind and legs. And the catch. This huge run is only during training. At the end of the journey, I won’t finish with cheers crossing a fancy finish line, it’ll just be me. Stopping my Garmin watch and limping back up our rocky driveway.

Although I do hard exercise routines; hike for hours; and run up mountains, my workouts still leave me feeling like I haven’t done enough. I face a constant self-nagging. I should have ran harder. Why didn’t I run one more mile? or ten more? Was that enough push-ups?
The other day, while putting the baby to sleep in her Mobi and hiking our homemade trail, it hit me. I should not only train for the race, which is in September, but practicing for my next training. Because my exercises exponentially rise in difficulty, my goals should follow these elevated efforts. This idea is common sense, but I haven’t invested in that commodity over the years.
My official race training starts in June, right now I am trying to bring my fitness, strength, mobility, and cardio to a level allowing me to survive the first week of 60k training. Even though my end goal is a 38 mile trail race. My next milestone is a much smaller landmark on the journey to my ultimate destination. And just like a road trip, I need to expect and prepare my itinerary for all the stops along the way.

My IT Band injury was only a flat on the highway. I have since strengthened them and look forward to putting a little mud on the tires.

If you’d like to follow my journey, start here.

Check out my new Facebook group for ultra-runners who weigh over 200lbs, otherwise known as Clydesdales! Find fellow husky runner’s weight-specific gear recommendations, injury mitigation strategies, fueling options, and more!