20 days and counting down!

Let's talk about Shot Bloks... do they have a physical or just a psychological effect?

In this package are 6 little gummy cubes that are supposed to give me energy while running more than 1 hour. I'm not sure if they really work, but even if they are just a placebo it seemed to help my run on Saturday! 9.5 miles and I wasn't dragging the last couple like usual. Now, this could be due to the fact that sharp shooting pain in my knee made me walk .5+ of a mile within the first 2.5 miles, as well as take 2 drink/shotblok breaks where I was able to sit down, rest my leg, and catch my breath... but considering the fact that it only took me 2 hours to get through 9.5 miles, I couldn't have been THAT slow. (Slow is a relative term... we are talking about 2 hours not being slow for someone who runs a 11-12 min mile on average :)).

The draw backs to these little gummies include the following:

1. Hard to chew while running - must stop to chew up 3 and drink enough fluid to get them down

2. You spend the next 5 min focusing on licking them out of the crevices in your teeth, which may slow down your race pace due to lack of concentration

3. The package is hard to get open - I had to chew it open

4. These little things are STICKY which is ok for the first 3 but the other 3 that you roll back up in the package and put in your pocket to eat in 45 min might be a bit of a mess

All in all they were tasty and I do think they may have helped sustain my energy level and keep me from hitting "the wall" - but not very practical.

Wednesday we will run 7 miles so I figure at mile 4 we will try a Gu this time around:

A small packet of less solid goo to slurp down with water while running - should have the same effect as a shot blok - just easier to carry, open, and no chewing involved. We'll see if I can gag it down or not ;-)

... as far as a training update let's just say that my IT band is causing me issues but I'm going to keep trying to work through that in these final 2 weeks of training. We have 20 days until Race Day and I have every intention or holding out hope until the last minute that I will be able to run. The 29th will be our 11 mile run and the last Saturday before the race - we will decide then if I can do the race or if Lukas will do it alone or not at all.

Run - roll - stretch - strengthen - rest - repeat will be my life for the next 20 days - wish us luck!