Last year, someone in the San Francisco Marathon FB group asked me if I was running ATB. At the time, I didn’t even know what ATB was. Turns out the Around the Bay 30k in Hamilton is the oldest road race in North America. One of its taglines is “Older than Boston”. 😁

Since 2019 was supposed to be our “Don’t sign up for any races because we are saving up for Dopey 2020” year, I had no intention of running ATB this year. To be honest, the medal is ugly which is a huge deterrent. The only thing that was *kind of* swaying me was that it’s the 125th anniversary of this race which really only happens once in a lifetime so you know… FOMO.

What really made me change my mind was when Jim announced that he will be running from ATB to the Boston Marathon and he wanted to see people come out to send him off. So of course, I willingly obliged and signed up. Twist my rubber arm.

After I signed up, I decided this would be my goal race for the year. Afterall, we weren’t going to sign up for any other races, right? Right. So, to make this worthwhile, I wanted to run a PB (sub-2:54) with a stretch goal of sub-2:50. I put together a training plan with these goals in mind, complete with tempo runs, interval workouts, crosstraining, LSD runs, recovery runs and rest days.

The race is 3 weeks out and I was talking to my coworker who has run it about 10 times. He tells me it’s quite a hilly course and he’d be surprised if I could get a PB because my previous PB was on a flat course, nvm my stretch goal. 😱😢😣😩

After he told me that, I felt sad and discouraged. I started to think maybe I had to reset my expectations. This led me to ask myself why I was letting this affect me so much. Afterall, I wasn’t even going to sign up for this race a few months ago.

I have come to realize that I want to PB because if I don’t, I will feel like I have failed. Maybe I didn’t train enough, I didn’t run my tempos fast enough, I didn’t do enough hills, I didn’t push myself enough during intervals, my long slow distance runs are not slow enough or long enough, I’m not resting enough, I didn’t lose enough (or any) weight, etc…

I know what you are going to tell me. It’s the journey that matters, it’s not realistic to expect a PB given the hilly course, just enjoy the race, give it your all and that’s what matters, you’ve worked really hard, etc.

In my head, I know all these things and that’s what I would tell someone else in my situation. However, in my heart, I know that I will be disappointed in myself if I don’t at least PB.

Between now and race day, I really need to convince myself that it will be okay if I don’t PB. I’m not a failure. I need to remind myself that running is a celebration of what my body can do. I’ve come such a long way in the past 1.5 years.

I know I will give it my all at ATB. If my all isn’t good enough for a PB then I guess I will just have to “suck it up, buttercup” and proudly wear that ugly medal like a boss.

Because I am enough.