Running through

"When you are beaten by an athlete running through, it means you are owned by him body and soul. The Fixed Order will have been established in a most definitive way, to be altered only by some kind of felonious conduct, possibly involving Claymore mines."- Once A Runner

So I have a race tomorrow, the Woodbury Country Mile half. As its in the middle of a training cycle, I'll be running through, meaning I won't alter my training at all in order to run it. Normally I'd take a day off two days before the race (so the race is Sunday, I would have taken Friday off). Instead, I havent taken a day off since Tuesday the 27th, and since then I've gone 10, 14, 7, and 8 later today. I'm pretty exhausted, but that might be for the better since I always seem to go out too fast and then crash and burn late. If you happen to be running that race, get at me. I'll be wearing a wisco XC kit and my compression socks.

So yesterday I went to pick up packets. I picked up mine as well as my roommates that I'm running with. I got lost. Like actually really lost and I thought I would have to call a taxi or my parents to get home. I took the afternoon off from work and took a bus toward oakdale, which is next to woodbury. Even though I was going to a mall, there was no bus stop there,so I had to walk the mile to get to the shopping center. That took me like 20 minutes because I was going the wrong way for a while. The weird thing is woodbury has no sidewalks, or at least not where I needed them. Google maps had me cross a highway, which was fine because there was an overpass, and then cross another highway which was super scary because not only was there no crosswalk or light that tells you to walk, there was a huge DO NOT WALK sign. I was thinking about turning around, but I didn't, because I didn't know how to get home.

Once I got across the highway, I got on this road that split into an onramp and a one way road to the mall a quarter of a mile in or so. That was kind of traumatizing because cars were just flying, but I made it. After picking up the packet, I had the same traumatizing experience walking out of the mall, but this time I had to go to a different street to take a different bus to get back to St. Paul. I was late, so I had to run the 1.2 miles to the bus stop in (in 7:18). I made it, and from that bus I took another to get home. Bottom line is, I need a car, badly. I left Minneapolis at 3:00p, and got back to my house at 6:30. Ridiculousness.

I bought the IAAF world championship pack for all the days from Universal Sports this morning. Right now I'm watching the marathon on replay, since I don't care about much except that and the womens 10k today. And yes, I already know what happens, and I don't really care. Mens 10k tomorrow though, its going to be an amazing field (start list here). For the record, my pick is Mo Farrah. A lot of people are picking Belke, and I don't know why. I don't think he'll show up at all, I don't think he's raced yet this year. Want to hear something crazy? Trey Hardee us the defending world champion in the Decathalon for America, but he isnt even #1 in his own country, Ashton Eaton is.