Totting it up

I did some math recently, and it kind of explained a lot.

It's been a long road this year.

A friend of mine had received her 250km distance badge from Happy Trails Racing recently, so I decided I'd sit down and figure out if I qualified. I've done every single Happy Trails race since their inception at Sticks n'Stones in October of 2017, so I figured it was a decent bet I had enough mileage in, particularly as you can use the sum of 2 years' worth of races.

So, I started adding, just from 2019..

44.72km of loopiness at Stride Inside in January
25km of mud and darkness at Rugged Raccoon in May
100km in the baking sun at Sunburn Solstice in June
43km of heat at Tally in the Valley in July
42.2km (or thereabouts) of hills and rocks at Falling Water in September

..for a total of 254.92km for 2019.

With loads of pretty sights along the way.

Then I thought a little further, and added in the mileage that was missing from that list.

23.32km of howling snowstorms at Frosty Trail in January
6.5km of lung-busting at Dion Winter Goose Chase in February
10km of wondering if I would survive the Canadian Snowshoe Championships in February
50km of the worst mud I've ever seen at Sulphur Springs in May
125.5km of crushing disappointment at Foxtail Hundred in August

..for a total of 470.24km of racing in 2019.

That seems like rather a lot.

Combine that with more overtime hours than I've ever worked in my life this year, and I'm tired.

Exhausted, really.

I tried to slow down and take it easy last weekend. What that ended up looking like was:

- cycling down to the market to do our shopping
- making brunch
- finally riding the ion LRT for the first time (it opened June 21st)
- visiting a bakery and eating too much sugar
- trying out a Dropbike
- visiting a specialty grocery store
- getting a tattoo
- having a campfire

SO RELAXING

Then I was up early to join in on the Sticks n'Stones training run on Sunday, where I fell and nearly broke my arm, ran 9km on a 5-ish kilometer course (some of the extra intentional, some of it not), and then went paddleboarding in a strong wind.

That gets us up to lunchtime

To cap off my super chill weekend, Tanker and I walked the 3.5km round-trip to the theatre to see a movie (so I did actually sit still for almost 3 hours), went grocery shopping, then made dinner and got stuff ready to go back to work.

I did take Monday off from running, but worked 2.5hrs of overtime, then another 3hrs of OT (with a lunch run) on Tuesday, and another hour on Wednesday - all on less than 6 hours of sleep per night - before having a bit of a meltdown that cancelled all plans for Wednesday evening.

Not sure how much of that was attributable to: fatigue, overwork, or this.

I did get a bit more sleep Wednesday night, kept the OT down to a half-hour yesterday, and got out for a trot 'round the neighbourhood in the evening, but it felt like someone had strapped a cinderblock to each leg, then another on my chest. My body and mind just feel so heavy right now, and it's affecting everything - my work, my running, and my ability to show Tanker the appreciation and affection he deserves.

So, I'm going to try to ACTUALLY take things a bit easier this weekend. I still need to work on my poor broken motorcycle, and I do still want to run some, but it has to be done in such a way that I don't overtax myself and can get lots of much-needed sleep.

I don't have another race for almost a month now, so it's time to make sure that I can make it to that start line without defeating myself before it even begins.

The hard part will be trying to slow down..

I may have to recruit some help.

Hope you all have a relaxing weekend!