The Power of Confidence

There have been some big changes in the Push Through Philly world since I last posted. For those of you not keeping track, that was nearly SEVEN months ago when I ran the Mohawk Hudson Marathon. Good gravy. The biggest change by far is that after 6 years, I have a new running coach.

I'm not going to go into the hows or whys in a public forum, but I have only love for my former coach. There was no drama, no messy fall out. I just knew my body and mind needed a change.

I'm excited to say that the past 6 months of running have felt pretty solid, and although the new plan is not radically different from my old one, there are lots of little tweaks that have me feeling stronger than I've felt in a long time.

One of the biggest changes has been in my confidence. The new coach hasn't done anything super specific to help with this, it's more a byproduct of the dynamics of working with a coach that has clients spread out across the country.

Along with my online teammates, I have the amazing team support from the Oiselle Volee. Even though I have all these new teammates, I don't feel like I'm in competition with any of them. We each have our own training plan, train for our own races, do our own thing. This was so much more freeing and liberating than I could have ever imagined. I have run with teammates that live in NY, and it's been great. Some of them ARE faster than I am, but I don't feel like we're in competition with each other. It's precisely that lack of competition that's given me the confidence in my own ability.

That, coupled with lots of "fast finish" workouts has made me feel (and run) stronger than I have in a long time.  So strong in fact, that when I ran the NJ Half two weeks ago, I ran my final 5k in 26:30. That's only ONE MINUTE slower than my PR, and my last mile of the race was in 8:22. Mile 13. 8:22. I am still blown away by that number. Even though I PR'd by a very small amount, executing my race plan to a T, even when the race conditions were against me, was a huge boost.

No one said running a PR in the rain was pretty

I feel like a giant weight has been lifted off my shoulders, and for the first time in a while I approach every run with happiness. (Ok, almost every run. If I have to run in the rain one more day I'm going to scream.)

I'm so excited to run the Brooklyn Half Marathon in two weeks, and celebrate my 30th half marathon. And of course, I hope the weather cooperates a little more, and I can tear up Ocean Parkway and make a bigger dent in that PR.