7- one week.

Oh man, I'm freaking out.  For some reason, I keep having these periods of intense nervousness that keep creeping up on me!  Even worse, now that it is T-one week.  I tried visualizing last night, which I think helped.  My marathon 'bible' says that you should practice visualizing 'bad' things happening during the race and then overcoming them.  For me, my main 'bad' things are: 
- feeling 'unfresh' in the first few miles and then freaking out mentally that my pace will get slow (even if I start out on pace)
- getting this weird hot spot on the bottom of my right foot (like a deep blood blister) that has been happening to me the last few marathons
- falling off pace and not being able to get back 'on'
- looking at my Garmin too much and freaking out

Now that I look at these, they are pretty much 90% mental- no surprise there.  I think alot of my troubles in the past year or so marathon-ing have been due to physching myself out mentally.  I believe this because my training is so much better/more intense than it was 2 years ago when I set my PR.  All of my runs are MUCH faster than then, my milage is almost double what it was, and I've included more speed/tempo stuff.  I say 'more' because it is not hard to put more when I used to do none!  Anyway, I really feel myself getting caught up in the numbers so much that it may be counterproductive.  I'm actually debating wearing my Garmin, because I am afraid if I see a single mile over 7:30 I'll freak out!  I printed out the splits (in wristband form) to run a 3:17 and I have to admit - it totally intimidated me.  Hense my feeling like I'm getting obsessed with numbers...lol.  The thing is, my PR race was just the opposite.  I had in my mind that I wanted to qualify for Boston (after narrowly missing it at Chicago in 95 degree weather the fall before...boo), but other than that, I just RAN.  I didn't think about where I wanted to be at the 5 and 10 and halfway point.  I don't even remember thinking anything until I hit the half and someone told me I was in 7th place for women! (yeah, it's a small race)  But for some reason, that totally energized me and made me just want to GO.  I want that feeling next week so bad, but I'm having a really hard time believing it can happen.  Perhaps as race time gets closer, and my legs get fresher.  I'm going to keep visualizing too- it can't hurt right?  Ah ramble-age!

And today?  Finally a complete rest day after 4 weeks, which was about 1 week too long.  Unfortunately, it was still an early wakeup call and a full day at the bakery.  My legs feel dead, so I'm going to rest as much as possible for the next week, only running 3 or 4 times totally less than 20 miles.  I figure, I'm as trained as I'll ever be, now I just need the rest. 

And sleep.  Finally tomorrow.  I bought coffee and a yogurt on the way home so I'm all set for a relaxing morning of prep work and chillin out.  Running later when I drive back to my town where one of my running friends is hosting a '5K'.  He has literally set up a course with a chute and snacks and prizes and invited all of our running group.  Should be lots of fun!

Hope everyone has a good day! :)