Look forward by looking back

Prepare to run the Devils Lake 50 miler tomorrow morning (23 hours until lift-off...), reflecting on the preparation of the last several weeks, I came away with these thoughts:

• The 28 miler several Saturdays back - Picking Kevin's brain, the experienced ultra guy.  His buddy Ryan.  Tim and Kate who clearly heard me say it was a 15 mile loop but chose to process "it's 10 miles..." :-)
• The 21 miler the next morning with Jocelyn, Jenifer and running dog extraordinaire Biscuit.  Always love spending time with Jocelyn, and this day it was great to get to know Jenifer and be amazed by her 8 lb. Yorkie Biscuit! 
• Meeting Kai face to face for the first time on a Wednesday night, on the trail, but only being able to spend 30 seconds chatting before the mosquitoes orchestrated a plan to simply carry me away.  That was my first time in the Minimus!
• The following weekends debacle of a long run with my buddy Matt.  Totally imploded on this day, but somehow if this has to happen, Matt is the right guy to be with.  So easy going and always has great perspective.
• Two weekends back Christina, Tim and Kate joining me for the first 15 miles of a night time trail run.  We laughed (and some of us ate bugs and then puked...), had a great time, and helped scare away the boogey-men, making my second dark lonely lap much easier (just wish we had scared away all the skunks :-)
• Kai taking the time to send two great emails with insights on the Devils Lake course and even sharing his fueling strategies and such.
• Then yesterday, a surprise fund raiser arranged by my coworkers at a local eatery where 20% of all monies spent go to my Running For RA cause.  Plenty of food and drink and fun enjoyed by all.  I don't know the dollar amount yet, but just seeing everyone coming out and having a good time was awesome.  A special thanks to my Tuesday night LifeGroup (i.e. Bible Study) that drove 40 minutes to attend.  You guys Rock!

I would be remiss to not mention the Freedom Striders, my Thursday night run club that I try to motivate and inspire - but am so often inspired by.

And then, of course, through it all, is my wife Pam, always asking "do you need anything?"  "what can I do to help?"  and special days like FB posts of "I'm so proud of this man..."

So, as I ponder my preparedness,  I'm struck by the blinding flash of the obvious that I've got some pretty darn cool people in my life, and if I carry that into the race, I'm gonna be just fine...

Press on friends.