10 Miles of Fun

10 mile run, 10 miles of fun. The ten mile run that moves it's way through Shelby Forrest is challenging and if you find that to be fun, then you will enjoy the MRTC road race series 10 mile run. It is definitely a fun, hard, up and down, mentally difficult, and beautiful (sight seeing, if you happen to notice as you run through) run.

I (Brett) pause to write this post because this particular run was a personal step in the right direction for me due to the mental realm into which it forced me. My brother was nice enough to help pace me and try and keep us right around 6 minute pace, but the hills had another idea for what my pace should be. As I crested these hills I found myself a number of times heaving for more air and struggling to refocus myself on the pace set out before me. I would say that there were probably seven moments in the race when I had to force myself to battle my own mind.

My high school running mentor who really started it all for me - literally, he even pursued me in middle school and somehow convinced me to run cross-country over soccer, a sport I absolutely loved playing - Sam Bell had a way of describing the type of run that this past 10 miler was for me. "Running just out of comfort zone," is what he used to say. He would use that phrase to talk about workouts usually, but that phrase really captures what this 10 mile run was for me.

Why is it so difficult for us to take ourselves out of the comfort zone... to push just beyond the threshold and embrace some pain? The great runners are those who live way beyond this threshold, or perhaps they have created entirely new thresholds altogether. And you know what I remembered during/just after this past 10 mile run? Running just past the pain threshold and embracing that pace hurts a little more, but it feels so good - it's fun. It sounds crazy but it's true. Convincing your mind to believe that and step on through is difficult, but you will find that it's entirely true. Maybe I won't make it back through for a while, but for now I'm so excited and revived to remember what it feels like to peep my head back through a little bit to beyond the threshold of pain to see the joy of what running really can be.

Will you come through with me to the other side to see the truth? Will you punch through and embrace just a little bit of pain to realize that some inner part of you will smile as it happens? Let's join our metaphorical running hands together and embrace the "just outside of the comfort zone" area and lets learn to live there baby!