Well, here we go … after I finish my last class today, I’ll take a bus to Changsha, where I’ll spend the night before flying to Beijing in the morning. There are about two and a half days until the marathon, and now there’s no turning back.

Yesterday morning, I decided to evaluate my progress. Even though I had run only once per week in the last six weeks, I felt like I was finally healthy again, over the sicknesses and injuries and busy schedule that had made the last two months so challenging. I knew that my body wasn’t quite prepared, but I felt confident and optimistic about my ability to go out there and run my best on Saturday. I felt great!

I decided to do one last workout, to test out my race day clothes and to give my muscles one more chance to loosen up before the race. So I got suited up and went out for a one hour run, separated at intervals by some steps in my school’s stadium. About fifteen minutes into the run, I felt strong, bounding up the steps with lots of confidence and energy.

Then I slipped. I fell forward, hitting both of my legs on the tiled stairs and catching myself with my right hand … not good. Both of my shins were cut and bruised, and I could immediately tell that I pulled a muscle in my neck … the same muscle that used to immobilize me for weeks at a time in college.

So, for the past day I’ve been nursing the injuries, spraying Yunnan Bayou on my legs, getting neck massages, and resting as much as possible. I’m feeling much better now, and I’m pretty confident that I’ll be near 100% on Saturday … but it was still pretty scary. Just leave it to me to do something stupid like that four days before the race!

As far as the marathon itself goes, I’m planning to run it intelligently. I’ll start off quite slow, hopefully running with some of the other WorldTeach volunteers who are also coming up to Beijing. Several of them are doing the half-marathon, so I should be able to stick with them and keep myself distracted for the first 10 or 12 miles. I plan to walk as many of the stairs as possible, taking my time on the difficult terrain and letting my body retain as much energy as possible. I’ve been doing a lot of research on training and techniques, and I’m pretty sure that I understand what my body will be going through as I push through the race.

And don’t worry … if I reach that limit, that place where it would be harmful or stupid to continue, I will stop. This isn’t a test of my manliness or a physical manifestation of my ability to commit … it’s a simple race. My “performance” on that big wall is much less important than the tremendous generosity that so many of you have shown through your donations to the children of Loudi. That’s the real story here!

With that being said … I still want to wait until after the race to announce the results of the fundraising efforts, in case if any of you are still thinking of donating to help the orphans of Loudi, my city. To read more about the effort and see how you can get involved, just click here!

I probably won’t be online at all in the next few days … I’m going to chill at my hostel, reading and watching movies and controling my physical activity as much as possible. I’ll schedule some automatic posts, though, to keep y’all entertained. And when it’s over, I’ll be sure to jump online and let y’all know how it went!

Onward!

Posted to webeldotnet on Wednesday, May 16th, 2007 at 10:12 am EST in Stories & Sports (comment feed). If you refer to this post on your blog, please trackback. Thanks!