Race Week!

It's finally getting here!  In 4 days I'll be driving down to Raleigh, and the race starts in 5 days.

Many of my doubts and fears remain, but I'm at least past some of them.  I did pretty well getting the miles and especially the long training runs in.  Was it really enough?  I don't know, but that's behind me now.  I feel good enough about it that I'm still setting 24 hours as a goal, though what I'm even more focused on is to really hold back the first 2 loops, if not the whole first half.  If that puts me behind 24 hour pace, I'm fine with going for a 30 hour finish.

I got through training without injury, other than the freak shoulder dislocations.  I'm still trying to decide whether I should put some KT tape on them to try to support/strengthen them, or if the tape would just annoy me.  They are feeling better but both still hurt in certain positions and 100 miles of swinging my arms seem likely to irritate them at some point.  I'll just have to deal with it and use safe amounts of Tylenol and Aleve to get through it. 

Nutrition is still a worry but I'll stick with my plan to have my own stash of food I should be willing to eat and know I can handle.  I used the long training runs to better see what I seem to be able to handle and what I can't.

Weather is always on the mind and while there's nothing I can do about the weather itself, I can prepare to deal with it.  The forecast has been bouncing around with high 70s possible during the day and snow flurries possible in the early morning start.  Right now it's looking cooler, with 30s and perhaps rain at the start, low 50s during the day, and near freezing overnight.  So I have to worry about staying dry early, and warm for the final few laps, but day time looks ideal.  But Thursday will be high 70s so if the cold front doesn't move in I'll have to deal with heat.  Luckily since I'm driving and it's a multi-loop course, I can take a lot of different clothes for all weather and be able to change as needed.  In case I'm reduced to walking the last loop or two in the cold, I'll even have my ski jacket along.

Other than that, I'll try to get full nights of sleep all week and eat well, and make sure I pack everything on my list.  There's a lot that could go wrong in the race, but at this point I've already prepared for everything I can think of, and there's no need to put negative thoughts out there anymore.  If and when problems come up, I'll either fix them or cope with them.  I've got a great crew (Marc and Christian) coming to help me through them.