The Night Before The Big Race, Take Two

It is the night before my second 50km of the month, which is a ridiculous thing to write. I am a lot more relaxed than I was before the first one, largely because I not only have the confidence of having done of these events, but also because I now know that preparing everything the night before, down to the smallest details, can still be completely derailed by things out of my control in the morning. So I’m relaxed. To be honest, it will be a big relief to get it done; it’s still not entirely clear to me whether or not signing up for these races was a good idea in the first place, as their looming arrival has caused me a lot of stress over the past few weeks. Once tomorrow is over and my UTMB points are in the bag, I plan to take a pretty decent break before even thinking about another target race again, so hopefully I can try to get back to simply enjoying running.

While this race has been responsible for a considerable amount of anxiety, I am very excited for it to be tomorrow, as I anticipate the race itself having the opposite effect. It’ll be 6 hours out on the trails, in nature, not only whisking me away from the hustle and bustle of the city but also giving me 6 hours of simplicity amidst a lifestyle that I am deeply frustrated at myself for having made this complicated. I thought that I would be keen to finish the second race quicker than the first, to push myself harder and to suffer more, particularly given how close I was to sub 6 the first time round, but right now I can’t really say the time bothers me all that much. If I have a tonne of issues and it takes me 8.5 hours, then so be it. It’ll be meditative, contemplative, and hopefully restorative.