Where Is The Line?

My brother is what I like to refer to as “charmingly cocky.” He’s pretty self assured about his place in life and not afraid to tell you how awesome (he thinks) he is. For the most part, I find him amusing, or charmingly cocky if you will. Maybe because I do the same thing but to a lesser degree. Anyway, having known a few people who have transitioned from charming, to cocky, to arrogant to arrogant prick, every so often I warn him that there is a fine line between charmingly cocky and arrogant. And girls are less inclined to put up with the arrogant. His response was “Heidi, there is a fine line between arrogance and excellence . . . and I walk it every day.”

While I was running the other day, trying to increase my mileage and speed in hotter weather, I was thinking about lines. Mostly because around mile 4, I was starting to feel like I was going to throw up. Turns out, there is a fine line between pushing yourself and throwing up. I’ve always managed to stay on the pushing yourself side of the line, but I never feel well after.

Why bother to push myself so much? Besides the fact that I’m most competitive when competing against myself? Because Hood to Coast, the 197 mile relay race that I always talk myself into doing, is a mere five weeks away. And I just found out that I have legs longer than I normally run. Which means its time to start gutting out some more painful distances.

Don’t get me wrong, I love HTC. It’s an amazing experience, the people involved are fantastic and its interesting to see what your body can do under unusual conditions. Like running on no sleep after being crammed into a van with five other sweaty people for thirty hours. None the less, I’m starting to feel a bit of panic as I have to eek out a few extra miles than my normal runs. It’ll come together, it always does, but a little fear or panic should go a long way in motivating me to train harder.

And the training isn’t too bad. I enjoy running. It’s me out there with only my iPod and my own thoughts for company. Actually, I come up with my best ideas for blogs while running. While worrying about whether or not I’m going to be ill because I’m pushing myself too much. Here’s hoping that in the next five weeks I stay on the pushing myself side of the line.