Mind Over Mileage

I'm trying to follow the intermediate training plan that Ragnar has on it's site and yesterday it called for the first 3 times a day runs. I decided to keep it a consistent 5-5-5. In the morning I got up and stepped on the treadmill and steadily finished off the first 5 miles. Kids were asleep when I started but before I finished I had my own little audience--bed heads and all. Nothing more fun than running on your treadmill and having full conversations with your children. They consisted of phrases like this: "Sadie, stay back, mama's almost done" or "Landon, will you go help Reece get dressed, I just have one more mile", or "Dayton, get off the computer, have you cleaned your room?" and "Is dad home yet?" Travis was running his 13 miler outside as he is training for this WBR thing as well.

Run #2 started off with sending my kids swimming at the neighbors (score) and me laying Sadie down for a nap. Travis is outside working on the endless home projects we have going on. I head out the door and decide to do the hill run down the road at 1 pm in the Arizona sun, luckily there was a breeze. I'm pretty sure the very second or maybe it was the millisecond I stepped in the door after my run I had Sadie with a stinky diaper crying walking towards me, a four year old saying "I'm hungry" and a pan with boiling water on the stove with two boxes of mac n' cheese waiting to be cooked. I almost had time to get a drink. Then it was off to the 4 loads of laundry, vacuuming, weeding, re-loading our master closet and laundry room (we had closet organizers put in the day before) and other duties as assigned that moms get to do on a daily basis.

It's 5:30 and I'm preparing to take off for my 3rd run of the day. The kids are playing with neighbors in the backyard. Travis is still working on projects (story of our current lives), I put some potatoes in the oven and a roast that has to cook for 50 minutes. My mile pace on good days on flat roads is between 9 minutes and 9:30 and I've already run 10 miles today and am a bit tired. I have to pound out 5 miles quickly in order to make it home in time or dinner will be burned. So I head out. Funny how my 3rd run of the day was the most relaxing. I fell into a steady pace and my playlist was very mellow. The sun was setting and there was a cool breeze. I walked through the door with a solid 4 minutes to spare. The roast was delicious.

That night I was thinking: On June 18th I get to go hang out with my friends for a whole day and a night and a day and I just have to run a little bit in between? No dishes, laundry, or rooms to be cleaned? No diapers to be changed? No meals to be made and cleaned up after? No weeding, mowing, planting or trimming? I just sit in a car in between the runs? And it is suppose to be hard? Hmmmmmm.