This is twenty percent skill--eighty percent gear

...to steal a line from the song of the week

I'm taking today off. I'm exhausted. My body hurts, I haven't been getting enough sleep, and my energy level is at a minimum. Yesterday, I made the most careless mistakes at work, I was so tired. I'm stressed out. I've lost my phone. I'm not eating well enough, or enough at all.

Hello, good to meet you, I'm whiny Brittany.

Well--actually, I'm going to see how I'm feeling after work. I might do the 7-mile run I planned for this morning. Now that I slept in until 7:30, ate a good breakfast, and took a morning off, I'm feeling much, much better. If I don't run tonight, I'm going to just shift everything over a day--that's easy enough! I have nothing but next week's birthday celebration planned, so I don't need to stress out about it. I want to go running tonight because I have new shoes!!

Yesterday, I went to Georgetown Running Co. and tried on a number of running shoes. I had a really helpful guy who is also running MCM and has been running forever.

Instead of the neutral shoe I was wearing, I chose the Asics GEL-Kayano, a light stability shoe. The only downside is its pink and really girly. I asked, but they didn't have it in any other color. Still, Asics have always done really well for me and the shoe felt great. My orthotics fit well in them.

I also got an anti-chafing bar and a whole bunch of sports gels, beans, and bars to try out. This is what they provide at races, so I wanted to see what I liked and start testing them on my long runs to see how my body reacts. 

All this came to an outrageous amount that could have bought me some new, beautiful pumps. A pair of patent leather, low-heeled black, pointy-toed shoes were stuck in the back of my head as I paid for my purchases.  My first two marathons I had no water belt, no special watch, no gels, bars, sports beans, special clothes, or training log... I just went out and ran with my iPod in old workout clothes and held a bottle of water. Now, I've actually gotten much better this time around, but I still wonder if I need all of it.

My Sauconys aren't completely shot, just a bit, and so I think I'm going to take these home so I have them there for when I'm visiting. I was staring at them last night and how worn in they are compared to my new, stiff Asics and I can't believe I've put about 500 miles on them. 500!! All in preparation for just 26.2. I mean, when you think about it, all this training is sort of silly. I've always taken motivation at the race from the idea that the starting line was back in May, this is only the last 26.2 miles. Its really all about the training.