So… Alison and I are really into the major part of our training for the Cherry Blossom 10 miler in Washington D.C.  having a race event to prepare for keeps me focused on my running and my eating habits… This week has been a packed training week… 10 miles on Sunday, 4 on Monday, 4 Tuesday with hills,
5 on Wednesday with intervals… Thursday off.. and then today was going to be my easy 4 mile run day… with tomorrow off.

I didn’t have a chance to run outside before work… so I packed my bag to head to the gym on my dinner break.. there aren’t a ton of people working out on Friday evenings so it was the perfect night for a leisurely run on the treadmill…  I could tell my legs were a little worn out from all of the tough work outs this week and from helping my mom move yesterday… they were thanking me for the slow pace…

Then… a man gets on the treadmill to my right… and almost right out of the gate he is running a 6:53 pace…  on my toughest interval run I go about a 7:30 or 7:00 pace on my fastest interval… sometimes I use the people on machines around me for motivation… a little silent competition that only I know or care about… well I could feel my inner drive pushing me to run faster and harder…

I kept thinking… just keep your pace… this is not a race… this man does not care how fast or slow I am running… legs are tired and over-training will lead to injury… do I really want to get injured with the race a little over a month away… how can I explain to Alison that I will be slow on race day because I had a silent competition with a stranger on the treadmill next to me that caused me to pull a muscle… ummmm it sounds silly in my head as I am typing it so I can only imagine how ridiculous it would sound being said out loud…

I did go a little faster than I intended on my second and third mile but as soon as I felt a twinge in my left hamstring… I slowed back down and put any fast thoughts out of my head… silly I know… but a small lessen in choosing wisely..as opposed to reacting foolishly..