Push it, push it real good

Motivation!

It screamed at me from the cover of Runner's World. The magazine had the key, 9 actually, to get me out there pounding the pavement. The writer suggested things like thinking positive, joining up with friends and doing workouts you love.

What can I say? Predictable, predictable, predictable.

You need real motivation to run.

Personal hygiene. Gross as it may seem, I try to avoid hair washing daily at all costs. It's taken a while to "train" it that way but I'm finally there and my scalp thanks me. I washed my hair yesterday, and I need to shower tonight because I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow morning. If I'm going to have to go to all the effort of washing my hair and such, I might as well get my time's worth by sweating it up beforehand. Rain or not, I'll be running 4.5 miles.

Pre-track your workout. I do this a lot with strength/cross training. If I know I should workout, I mark that I've done so on MyFitnessPal. I'm less likely to skip it because going back and removing it blows chunks.

A decent race time. My average pace for my 8 miles at RnR NOLA was 9:09. Do you know what that means? And if you say that I missed running sub-9, I might hit you. A 9:09 average is just what I would need to run to get a sub-2 finish at the Martian half-marathon next month. I know it's not what I've been training for and it would have to come down to perfect race conditions but that number was all that I could think about yesterday. It was that number that motivated me to do my interval workout even though I had the stroller. I had 7x400 on tap and though I didn't do the prescribed workout, I did 1:30 hard followed by 2 minutes easier for 7 or 8 times during my 4-mile run.  It might have been that 9:09 that pushed me to one of my fastest stroller miles ever - 8:55. (Thanks MOTOACTV for letting me check my stats online on Mark's computer. Booyah!)

Double the fun. We can all go out and sign up for a 5K and "stick" to training plan. But come race day, we can dial it in just because. Well, when you have someone else depending on you, it's a whole lot different. I know I ran harder in NOLA because I didn't want to disappoint my friend and I know she trained and ran harder for the same reason.

Chocolate milk ... or beer. When Pattie and I were walking back to the shuttle, we were trying to be good runners and cheer on those who were heading toward the finish line. I started shouting that they were just a few strides away from chocolate milk (the best ever recovery drink if you ask me). And the Pattie started with the two beers because, well, there were two beers. It's probably not all that amusing to you but I can assure you that we thought we were being funny helpful. On a hotter by the minute day, who wouldn't run for beer or chocolate milk? I know I shouldn't advocate caloric reward for sweat but you gotta do what you gotta do.

Do you have an unconventional way of motivating yourself?