It’s almost time for the Boilermaker road race. Excitement and nervousness fill my body. Every year I say “If I can come in at 70 minutes, that’s it! I’m done! No more Boilermakers!” The reality is that I’m just not that fast. I’ll be running Boilermakers for a long, long time.
Some of my running goals are unrealistic. Sure it’s great to have goals and maybe some of those goals are far reaching but as long as I can maintain perspective, realize my limits, then why not hold tight to those extremes? Who knows, anything can happen on any given day and that one race might be the day.
How do you run a race with an aggressive goal and keep it in perspective? You start off slow and build. You check with your body to see if it’s going to be one of those days when you have the ability to push towards the end. The worst strategy anyone can do is set the goal then start with a do or die attitude. I think you just set yourself up for failure. Our bodies are unpredictable. Give yourself some slack.
If you’re going to have a race where the goal is attainable, you’ll feel it in those first few miles. You won’t loose anything by allowing your body to tell you “it’s on” … or it’s not. Enjoy the gift of running, whether slow or fast, make sure to enjoy the ride.
Do you read about other’s goals and how they struggle to achieve them? What would you recommend when they continually beat themselves up by thinking they’ve failed?
A Jerk Experiment
I recently picked up some Caribbean Jerk Seasoning to spice things up in a different way. My first experiment with the seasoning were the following fritters. I had to be careful because zucchini is a delicate veggie by way of taste. I didn’t want to overwhelm the dish with spice. In addition, I like spicy hot but Ted likes spicy mild so the utmost care had to be taken not to over season.
The result? Not a one was left on the plate. Wish I had made more.
Makes 4 Fritters
*It’s very important to salt and squeeze moisture from the grated zucchini. You won’t get it to brown with too much moisture.
- 2 medium zucchini, grated (Grating zucchini is easy to do using a hand grater. Just make sure you wash it well first and cut off the ends).
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 teaspoon or up to 1 TBS Jerk Seasoning
- 1 large egg, slightly beaten
- 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
- 1 TBS Agar Agar or use Cornstarch
- About 2 TBS of olive oil to fry.
After you grated the zucchini, place in a colander and sprinkle with 1/2 tsp salt. Allow to stand about 15 minutes. Dump the zucchini into a clean towel and squeeze out the moisture. Put into a mixing bowl.
Add the following to the zucchini: Jerk, Egg, Flour, Agar or Cornstarch. Mix to combine.
Heat oil in a large frying pan over medium to medium high heat.
Use a 1/4 cup measuring cup and scoop up the zucchini and place into the frying pan. This should work out to be 4 zucchini mounds. Don’t compress flat. Allow to cook 4 minutes per side.
Enjoy!
Have you used Jerk Seasoning?
What’s your favorite Caribbean inspired recipe?
Anything can happen on any given day………………..yes, exactly! I say Go get it, girl!
GOOD LUCK at the boilermaker!
I think setting aggressive goals can actually be good. It keeps you focused and pushing yourself but the reality is you need to look at progress more than hitting the actual goal. If your goal is 70min but you improve from last year, that’s success. For running though, keep in mind that as the years go by, you’ll slow down a little bit. So do go easy on yourself and enjoy the race! You are doing what you love to do and that’s the most important part. 🙂