Hood to Coast Training

I just finished planning my training for the next 12 weeks. The purpose of this is to survive the Hood to Coast race, for which I have willingly paid money (????) to participate. The above picture is my husband and I (smiling, so obviously before the race) at Timberline Lodge, the start of the Hood to Coast race. I ran leg 4 (the easiest) and Shane ran leg 5 (the hardest, naturally.) This meant that he was waiting for me at the end of each of my 3 legs that I ran. I loved this idea at first, but after I handed the team bracelet off to him the first time and he took off, I was like "WAIT! I just ran a Very Hard Race! Aren't you proud of me?? We need to talk about this!!!!" But of course, he did not stop and by the time I saw him again, he had run his own miles and wanted to debrief the course, the condition of his knee, and most importantly his ROADKILL COUNT. That's the number of people you pass while running your leg. I made the early mistake of providing a large piece of poster board and markers to record this on the outside of our van. I can only assume that whoever read it felt pity on the obviously handicapped "Jill" of few roadkill count hash marks.

Like childbirth, time has dulled the memory of the pain of this experience. Sort of. Also like pregnancy, once you are irrecoverably committed, you start to go "WAAAAAAAAAAIT a minute. I remember this. I'm SCAAAAAAARED!!!!!"

So it's time to get training. My summer calendar is now filled with lovely things like "tempo run" and "hill sprints." Aren't I going to have fun? I'm sure the whole experience will like, build character or whatever.
Wish me luck!