The Pay-off

Through all the training this season, working at getting my triple, I never doubted I could do it....until Lost Souls in Lethbridge.  After that race I really had given up the triple for this year until I was convinced to sign up for Iron Horse.  When I finally decided to sign up I knew I was going to finish.  There was no way I was going to quit two races in a row.  The big challenge was balancing recovery with training.  I had come off of Lost Souls putting almost 100 km under my feet and with only a month until I attempted another 100 mile race there wasn't alot of time for recovery.  I tried to take a balanced approach.  My longest run between the two was about 25 km.  I felt it was better to go in uninjured, and the reality was that I wasn't going to decondition and lose what I had built up over this season in just 4 weeks time.  Race day there were 10 of us registered in the 100 mile race.  7 of us finished (1 DNF and 2 dropped to 100km).  I was the only female and I placed 4th overall.  And, I got my triple.  The big surprise came a few days ago.  I checked the Alberta Ultra Series site just to see if they had the triple results posted yet.  I placed 1st in the female 35 - 59 age category overall for the Alberta Ultra Series!! 

I love running.  I would say 95% of the time I love it through all the early morning training runs, the 50 km training runs, the races and events.  When I look at it from that perspective, I am not going to let the 5% of the time where I hurt and don't want to continue dictate the outcome.  I love to run and the do it because I love it...that's the real pay-off.