GASP! You read correctly. Slow Girl (the control freak, the planner to a fault, the one who should take a chill pill already), says, “Sometimes, you gotta ditch the plan.” I never ditch the plan. I make the plan, baby. But a couple of weekends ago, I ditched the plan like one bad-ass plan ditcher.
You see, my half marathon is coming up this Sunday (as in three days from now) and I haven’t been following my training plan like a good obsessive planner would do. It’s my second half marathon so it’s not like I haven’t run 13.1 miles before. I’m sure I can do it even if I’ve missed several mid-week runs, skipped a dozen or so cross-training workouts and missed just one long slow distance run. Sure, it was the longest run of the training program that I missed but whatever…it was just 11 miles. Besides, it’s not like I sat around on my butt that weekend and did nothing at all. I did something just as challenging and strenuous as an 11 mile run. I had a family dance off, yo!
A couple of weekends ago my youngest sister, Amy, graduated WITH HONORS from college. Impressive, I know. I flew to California and met up with my younger sister, Andrea, my mom, my step dad and my niece, Angela. Since we live in different states, it’s a pretty special occasion when we are all under the same roof. Throw in a college graduation and a good time is guaranteed! Spending time with my family always brings me great joy and this trip did not disappoint!
On Saturday night, after all of the graduation festivities, Angela and Amy suggested we play a fun game called, “Just Dance 4.” What? You’ve heard of it before? Well, apparently everyone in the universe has heard of it except for me. It’s a Wii game and you follow the dance moves of the pretend dancer on the screen. The better you follow the moves (using the remote thingy) the more points you get. I’m not a dancer. I have no rhythm, no groove, no grace, no nothing. But when challenged to a dance off by my little sister and niece, I said, “Bring it on, you little whippersnappers.” And so the evening began. A snap shot of the night:
Amy is on the left, she’s the one actually dancing. I’m on the right, trying to not pee my pants from laughing so hard. That was my second dance outfit of the evening. Lesson: Don’t ‘Just Dance’ after drinking a ton of water all day….jumping up and down does not mix well with hard-core laughter.
I pulled myself together, put on my game face and danced to this fun song, “Call me Maybe.” I lost but was given bonus points for best facial expressions. Yay me.
$h!t got real when the song, “Moves Like Jagger” came on. A little dance off with Andrea was underway…I wanted to win SO bad. I didn’t.
So you see…sometimes when you ditch the plan, there is a WAAAY better plan out there. For me, it was dancing like a dork with my family all night long. Did I deviate from my training plan and miss my 11 mile run? Yep. Did it really matter in the grand scheme of things? Nope. Was I sorry that my family made me laugh so hard I peed my pants? Not really. Am I going to buy my own Just Dance game so I can secretly practice my moves for the next reunion/Dance Off? Hell yeah!
As for my half marathon that’s coming up in three days…I’m feeling fine physically and great mentally/emotionally. My head’s in a good place, I feel like I’m going to kill it. I’ve completed a 10 mile run during my training so what’s a few more miles? Honestly, I think spending time dancing with my family was more beneficial to my race preparation than running my scheduled 11 miles all alone.
To Sunday’s Half Marathon: Ready or not, here I come!
Does emotional/mental preparation play a role in your training? Do you freak if you deviate from your training plan?
