When Life Intervenes

Race day looms. As many of you know, I've been training for the Twin Cities 10 Mile race.  And now, the day of reckoning is upon us. The TC10 is this Sunday, one part of a weekend full of running events culminating in the Twin Cities Marathon (also on Sunday, they start about an hour after the 10-milers). This Sunday. Four days from now. Holy -- when did that happen?

In many ways, I feel prepared and confident about the race. I've run the distance more than once, and I even ran the course last weekend (you go uphill and then uphill some more). I'm contentedly tapering right now, giving my body some much needed rest. I have my hydration and fueling strategy worked out. On the other hand, I'm feeling a bit scattered and unfocused. I'm in the middle of moving from Minneapolis to St. Paul, so needless to say I'm stretched a bit thin. 

I haven't slept much the past few nights. I felt great during our training runs, but that's no guarantee for how I'm going to be feeling on race day. Also, I'm not sure where any of my running gear is. I marked the box "priority," but then I lost the box. In the absolute best case scenario, the week before a race involves lots of sleep, relaxation, low stress, nutritious meals, easy runs and maybe a dash of cross-training. In the real life scenario, you have a crazy work week, there's a debate watch party that will keep you up late, your life is split into two trailers parked in garages around the city, lunches and dinners are a hurried afterthought, and "tapering" turns into a complete halt.

We'd all love the ideal scenario, but life intervenes and you have to adapt. For my part, I'm going to count moving into an apartment on the third floor (no elevator) as cross-training.  I'm also going to limit my Friday night activities to unpacking a couple of boxes and going to bed at 9:30. Oh, and carbo-loading!

What about you? How do you deal with day-to-day obstacles -- whether you're preparing for a race, or just trying to fit in your weekly workouts?