
The greater part of Saturday afternoon involved downing bottle after bottle of PhD Nutrition. Flavored and unflavored. Smoothie and drink. I drank it.
Sunday morning presented itself in the way of beautiful sunshine and a calm breeze. I didn't quite know if I'd replenished everything I burned up the day prior, but the short warm up run to the Second Seed starting corral felt relatively good.
We had about 15 minutes before the 9 o'clock starting gun. I looked down at my purple Motion IIIs by Newton, thankful for the way they felt and, in races past, have helped me run faster and more efficiently. I sported my new Big Sexy running singlet for the first time, thankful the day felt warm enough to wear nothing more than that and shorts.

It seemed as though I gained speed and momentum with each person I passed. Three hills down meant I just had Doomsday to scale. I couldn't remember at the time what my hill repeats up Doomsday had taken me in the weeks prior. All I could think about was how much faster I felt I ran compared to the times I'd struggled up it on Thursdays after work.
In years past, I'd learned I always felt my worst in the mile following Doomsday. So imagine my surprise when I saw that my split for mile 6 was faster than that for mile 1! In an instant, I suddenly had fuel, pure motivation, determination, whatEVER, to make me run faster than I ever have at Bloomsday.

I sit on the couch, one week later, struggling to balance the triumph of a breakthrough performance with the onset of left piriformis pain that suddenly reared its ugly head on Thursday after an easy run. Of course, my psyche currently feels relatively frail when I consider I'd like to run Bay to Breakers with my family next weekend. Perhaps my biggest concern revolves around the fact Troika is just three weeks away. I can only pray massage, trigger point, and heat calm my throbbing butt cheek.
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