"It's gonna hurt"

At the moment I’m down in sunny (but not exactly warm) Panama City Beach, Florida for the 10th Anniversary Ironman Florida. (Side note: I’m starting to think these “10th Anniversary” events may be my forte – unknown to me at the time, my first marathon, the Flying Pig, was in it’s 10th year, as was IM Lake Placid, so not that I’m doing them all particularly well, but I am doing them – I’m also scheduled to do the 10th edition of Nashville’s Country Music Marathon in 2009).

So, I can’t say I’m all that confident headed into Saturday’s race, but I can admit that I feel differently than I did about IM LP. Lake Placid was so much fear, and about survival more than anything. Now, well maybe because I’ve been through it and know what to expect (god help, and yet I’m still giving it another shot!), maybe it’s that I’ve learned a lot and at least know what I WON’T do this time – like become dehydrated, maybe it’s because the race course and flat terrain play far more in my favor than did hilly Lake Placid, maybe because I know it won’t be pouring, torrential rain all day long, maybe it’s because I’ve had more time to train and just generally feel far better prepared, or maybe it’s just because I know the ‘end is near’ and after Saturday, for a time at least, I can resume a normal life where I can still ‘workout’ but won’t have to endure endless 15-20 hour training weeks.

Actually, I’m sure it’s some combination of all of those things that are helping me feel different about this Ironman, helping me feel better about it. I hope it goes better, I want it to go better, and actually I need it to go better than IM Lake Placid. Not that LP was so bad, but it definitely was an extremely painful struggle for me, mentally, physically and emotionally, and I have a hard time thinking that I could do this race if it’s equally as rough. I want to suffer less, and I really want to enjoy it more, if such a thing is possible.

As Ryan, my coach has told me on more than one occasion, “Mary Lou, you KNOW it’s going to hurt.” And of course he’s right, no one finishes an Ironman without a fair amount of pain and discomfort – so that’s a ‘given.’ But I think its a reasonable and realistic goal and expectation that I suffer for a shorter period of time for this outing.

So that’s it, in two days time, this “year of the Ironman” will be in the books. When I get back home, and have time to think about all that’s happened to me this past year, I hope I’ll gain some insight as to what it’s all meant, how I feel about it, what I should do with it, where it’s taken me and where I can go with it – in the meantime, I can just tell you all that it has been an awesome ride, I’ve met some incredible people and made some great friends and have gotten an unbelievable amount of support and inspiration from friends and family and strangers a like – it’s definitely been a ‘great ride’ – and well, it's all right, I'm going to the end of the line...