The Taper

Saturday marked what our running coach, Rachel, calls our official "taper" start. The countdown to race day, December 6. No more 7 hour runs. No more 20, 22, 23 mile weekends one after another. No more 2 1/2 hour Sunday runs following the 20 mile Saturday runs. My feelings, as is often the case in these circumstances, are mixed. Excitement for race day, to experience a full 30+ mile run, to test my conditioning. But also a twinge of melancholy as this small chapter in my life comes to an end. I'll miss seeing the group each Saturday morning, I'll miss the shared goal. I'll miss the satisfaction of marking off my training days and having the commitment to stick to them. I suspect the thought of unfocused free time makes me anxious. The lack of a goal. I trained hard to qualify for the Boston Marathon at CIM last year but once I did I had little motivation to actually sign up to run it. My goal was to qualify. Of course, I finally did register and though my training was dodgy I had an incredible experience. So yes, seeing the end approach leaves me somewhat wistful.

We started our taper with a 13 mile run covering some of the race course, including the steep Dias ridge out of Muir Beach and the less steep, although long and taxing, Marincello hill out of Tennessee Valley. (Note: Although I did walk this entire hill in the Pirates Cove race despite Jessica's efforts to get me to run, we were able to push the pace a bit this time and actually passed 2 mountain bikers going up the hill. Kinda funny. Runners passing bikers.) It was sunny but cool as we started out early and quickly climbed over the ridge and on to the Miwok trail that wrapped us upwards overlooking Marin and the GG Bridge. Our other coach, Jim, seemed to be everywhere with words of encouragement. Jenny and I ran comfortably. Saul and Dustin, from Crossfit, made their first foray onto the actual course with surprising ease and comfort. Everyone was in great form. We finished with a cold 10 minutes standing in the water to help our legs recover before I had to dash off to a wedding in Carmel.

It was a perfect day with ideal conditions and, it seemed, a general sense of readiness permeated the air. The great results from the Stinson race, the gains in strength, the miles logged without injury - it seems to be channeling into race focus now. Several of us were trying new shoes, others were dialing in the last keys to their nutrition plan. The race prep excitement is there. If the taper only builds on that, then I think we are all in for an amazing day.

Hmmm, what next?