Last night, three of my friends rallied to watch the 10:30pm showing of McFarland USA, the cross country Disney movie about the true story of McFarland High School’s 1987 cross country team.

As a high school cross country runner myself, how could I not see this movie. There aren’t very many movies themed around long-distance running! (For good reason, I suppose…) We had the whole theater to ourselves!

Even I’ll admit, running is not an entertaining sport for mass audiences. You have to be a runner to really appreciate a movie dedicated to the sport. It’s not glamorous or commercial or suspenseful. Once, I raced a 10k at Mt. SAC Relays in Walnut, CA, and my parents came to watch. There were EIGHT heats of the 10k and I was in heat #7. A 10k race = 25 laps around the quarter-mile track. About 40 minutes til the last person finishes. My parents sat through over four hours of laps so that they could watch me run for 37+ minutes. That is love! :)

McFarland was inspirational as any Disney flick, though I have to say my favorite Disney sports-themed movie is The Rookie. We did all definitely leave the theater feeling motivated to go for a run. But it was after midnight so we went to sleep instead ;)

*Side Note: the best trailer we saw was for the newest Nicholas Sparks movie, The Longest Ride. Yes, it looks exactly like all his previous stories. Yes, it looks predictable and cheesy. Yes, I will be going to see it. Trailer –> here.*

Training for marathon #2 is underway. I have a weekly schedule of workouts with ideal mileage, pace, hill repeats, speed intervals and strength training.Yesterday was some hill repeats, 60 second bursts up a steep grade with 2 minutes jogging in between.

Nutrition is especially important to fuel my workouts so I stocked up on some more protein and planned out weekly “mostly-clean” dinners. However I am completely exploiting the fact that more mileage = more ice cream.

We are in the middle of a couple winter storms. Snow = compromising on the treadmill. This weekend’s long run will test my mental abilities as I have 11 miles on the treadmill! Only some new music will get me through.

This song came on the other days as I pulled into my parking space. I’d never heard it before so I parked and sat in my car for 3 minutes, shazam’d it, and have been overplaying it ever since. :)