By Dawn Kosloski, Co-owner, Bikini Boot Camp
I can’t believe I am a week away from the actual race! The past 2 weeks since my last blog have flown by and I have knocked off another 141 km’s. I have an easy 5km run or walk to do this week and then the big day…42km!
Since January I have trained, thinking that May 30 was such a long way off. But here we are in the final week. My goal was, of course, to run a marathon but what I have learned along the way is that it’s not just about the running.
Yes there is definitely the physical training that comes with doing a marathon but there is also the mental training of striving for your personal best. And your personal best is different for everyone. When someone used to ask me how fast I ran I would always preface giving them my time with “I’m not a fast runner, I run about a 1 hour 10km run.” Now looking back on this answer I see how I was not confident about what I was doing and I was minimizing what an amazing accomplishment that even running 10km is, no matter at what speed. After having gone through this training, I answer that question now in a very different way!
This experience has taught me even more, that every person is unique and does their personal best in their own way. And the group that I trained with exemplifies this. Our group is like a big pack of rubber bands that we buy from Staples - there are green ones, blue ones, long ones, short ones, thick ones, thin ones - but we all have our strengths in how we do things. I evidenced this during hill training, speed work, long slow distances, and tempo runs. Each person excelled at something. And sometimes it was just for one day, when they were having a rock star run, on their rock star day. But everyone in our group excelled. And as we did our final speed work at the end of the week, and then faced the “dreaded” Shaganappi Hill this morning, I marvelled at everyone as I watched them have their shining moment, their personal best, their rock star day, during some part of the run. Whether it was on the up hill, or the down hill, or the flat, each person had their own personal best for today, including me.
And also what I marvelled at this morning was how I did not compare myself to anyone else in the group - I wish I could run better on the hills like that person, or be faster on the flats like that person, or look more smooth when I run like that person - I was just happy to be sharing this experience with these amazing people, and happy to have come this far for my own personal best. I am not sure what type of rubber band I am in the big pack of rubber bands - I would like to think I am the one that holds it all together, never snaps, and is flexible and open to change

- but I know that whatever type of rubber band I am, I am the best rubber band I can be! And I have learned that every run, no matter what my speed, time or feeling is, is a rock star run, on a rock star day.
So now, when someone asks me how fast I run, I tell them “I run a super fast and fabulous 1 hour 10km run!” That is my personal best!
**Dawn is Co-Owner of Bikini Boot Camp, with her best friend and business partner, Lindsay. She is passionate about experiencing people, activity in the outdoors, and all that life has to offer. She will be running and blogging her way to her first marathon.
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