Race weekend is creeping up!

I'm very excited to head down to Cincinnati this weekend for the Flying Pig Marathon.

It's shaping up to be a hectic weekend! Friday I'm taking a half day at work and getting Lizzie to Worthington, where Molly was kind enough to offer to dog sit. Then it's off to Fleet Feet to pick up my favorite flavors of Gu, to the Y to teach one more class then home to pack.

Saturday I'll be up bright and early to cheer on all the MITers and the Run DMCers at the Capital City Half Marathon. I'm really excited to see so many people come through, especially those who are racing for the first time! I'll probably end up bumming around Columbus for a few hours until it's time to meet Brandie D., Rebecca E. and Ryan G. to head down to Cincinnati.

We'll get to Cincinnati around 4 p.m., then we're headed straight to the expo! I'm so excited to do a little shopping and load up on swag :)

Then we're meeting some other Run DMCers for dinner at 7 p.m. at Arnold's Bar and Grill in downtown Cincy. I'm so excited about this place, it has a gluten free menu and lots of pasta!

Somehow, I'm supposed to get a good night's rest, then it's up early again Sunday for a 6:30 a.m. start time! Hopefully Mother Nature will be good to us.

I've had a lot of ups and downs in the past few weeks so I'm not sure how I'll be feeling. I'll either run the whole thing at a 12-minute pace, or do a 4:1 run:walk ratio. I'm hoping for the former. No matter what, I'll be getting my medal!!

I got there! 22 miles done!

This has been the toughest marathon training season yet, so I'm thrilled to say that I've reached the taper point. I completed my 22-mile run this morning with MIT.

I met early with Team 12, which again put my wakeup in the 4:30 range. I set out with Michele H., Kate, and Ruth, a half marathoner who was joining us. We ran 5.5 miles in one direction, stopped back at OhioHealth to drop Ruth off and be tortured by a bake sale, and then continued 5.5 miles in the other direction. This made it really easy to break the run up mentally, something I've really struggled with at this slower pace.

I'm too exhausted to do a mile-by-mile recap. I was in great company the entire way. I got the usual disheartened feeling at Mile 13 of being completely exhausted but nowhere near done, and the last five were really tough but I powered through. I was bummed that I didn't get to do a journey to The Shoe this year but it was nice to have a change of scenery!

I'm experimenting with a Gluten Free diet for a variety of reasons, which are well thought out and legit. (Plus, like, Miley Cyrus did it and she got so skinny... jk, jk). Kim B. has been so helpful, she's gotten many texts from me while I'm lost in the shelves of Kroger! (Which I've actually found to be the best of our two stores about labeling).

So, that brought about a problem for the run! Before every single long run I've eaten pasta the night before, a bagel with almond butter and preserves the morning of, and a bagel after. And Michele's email said something to the effect of "treat today's run like race day, don't have anything new." Well, unfortunately, there was lots new.

Last night for dinner I did broiled tilapia with a GF sauce and potatoes. This morning I had my almond butter and preserves on a GF english muffin, which wasn't horrible! And since I couldn't have a bagel after, I went for a snickers bar instead! Man it was hard walking past those bagels though! (And a bake sale, for that matter!) I did take 3 Clif Shots during the run which unfortunately might contain gluten, but I've done well otherwise.

Tonight, I have ice cream and wine, two things that are totally acceptable :)

Bring it on, Mr. Pig.

MIT Year 2

This weekend I officially registered for Fleet Feet Columbus' Marathoner in Training program for 2012!

I make this case so often in this blog, MIT is a phenomenal program and I'd recommend it to anyone wanting to run a half or a full marathon!

So this means I'm committed to 2 marathons for 2012!

The spring marathon will either be the Flying Pig marathon in Cincinnati or the Canton Marathon.

Fall marathon is an easy choice: I'm going to run Columbus again! The MIT and crowd support was enough to make me want to do it again.

After reacquainting with my pillow and my TV, here's what's next!

Me and running buddy Karl showing off our
marathon medals at Brews.
I'll do an official photo post soon!! 

I can't get the 30 Rock theme out of my head. Because making it through the end of Season 2 (love the episodes with Edie Falco) and most of Season 3 has been hands down the most productive thing I've done since the 2011 Columbus Marathon. (Tracy Morgan just tried to kill Jimmy Fallon. Very nice.).

**Warning: Pointless, scatterbrained post ahead**

That's outside of work, that is. I did get to cover what will probably be the story of the year, when a bunch of wild animals were set free in Zanesville, Ohio. In between chuckles over the increasing absurdity of the story, I managed to get one of my stories picked up by USA Today, and another by the Cincinnati Enquirer. (Insert shameless plug for professional Facebook page here.) 

"It's like Noah's Ark wrecking here in Zanesville." Jack Hanna

And here's some more news: I'm now a certified Spinning instructor. Starting in November I'll be teaching at the Newark Y, 6 a.m. Wednesdays and 6:30 p.m. Thursday. So if you're in my neck of the woods come see me!

Spinning was the only activity I did last week, so my DailyMile displayed a whopping one workout. I proudly posted this shining accomplishment on Facebook and Kim B. promptly responded: "Hey...you are supposed to be taking it easy."

Facebook post from Monday 10/24. 

Spinning Thursday was fun but slightly nerve-wracking. Jamie let me be in front of the class with her. Once I'm settled in and on my bike I realize I'm in a 90-minute class. But Jamie ran Columbus too (and we wore our twin shirts that day to prove it), so if she could do it, I had no excuse. I survived the first half no problem. Most of the class left at the break, leaving just a few brave souls. Jamie let me cue some jumps, and I learned that it is not easy to talk and count in my head. 

Race Report: 2011 Columbus Marathon

Today was a runner's nightmare. I overslept!!!

But despite the biggest thing that could possibly go wrong on race day going wrong, I beat my Cleveland time by...

Wait for it...

Drumroll please...

19 MINUTES!! 

I ran the Columbus Marathon in 4:13:12, an average pace of 9:40, beating my Cleveland time of 4:32:50 (average pace 10:24). I am shocked at my time. I can't believe I did that well.

So my morning went like this: Heard the alarm go off at 4 a.m. thought I hit snooze but I didn't! Next thing I knew it was 5:15. 

Fortunately, I still had time to get there -- gun was at 7:30. Fortunately, Lizzie Dog peed right away. Fortunately, I had packed everything the night before so I was able to just grab my bag and go -- I'm out the door by 5:30. Fortunately, there were no cops on 161!  

I get into Columbus by 6:15 but traffic was snarly. It takes me a half hour to get parked and by the time I get to the Hyatt, where MIT was meeting, it was time to head to the start. "Way to scare everyone by showing up late," says Bill B. as I hand him my bag to put on the truck. I grin. 

We start the procession toward the start and I catch up to some of the 10:30s walking. "JESSICA!!!!!" Kim says, "You had us so worried!!" 

We get to the start and I have to pee big time. The line for the regular port-a-johns is atrocious, so Meredith, also in our pace group start poking into local businesses looking for a ladies' room with no line. In Dunkin' Donuts, someone tells us where there is a port-a-potty with no line. Jackpot!! Actually it had a short line, far more bearable still. We make it to the start just in time. 

There's no hope of finding the pace teams, it's too crowded, too many people!! That's right, I ran the whole thing without a pacer, and pretty consistently too!

Nervous ramblings as race day approaches

*****GULP*****


The Columbus Marathon is SUNDAY!

To say I'm nervous would be a vast understatement. This is marathon #2, and what I'm going to write is complete deja vu from what I wrote before Cleveland:

"Here's what killed my confidence... I'm ashamed to say it but I dropped the ball on my training."

So, yea, totally dropped the ball on my training -- and I don't have a move to blame it on this time.

Everything went great through the final 12 (well, 13.1) mile run. Then I went out two days later. And my legs just wouldn't move! I ran with Karl in Granville, he tried to push me to no avail, I gave up after 1.5 miles.

Ok, I needed rest. I took 2 days off. I was visiting my parents and tried to go out for 3 miles that Friday. Part of it was maybe the big dinner, but this time 2.5 miles was too much. Now I'm getting nervous.

The next day was my Spinning certification class, which I'll blog about in a separate post (likely after the marathon). I let two really difficult spin classes take the place of the 8-mile run. I burned almost 800 calories between them, so I didn't feel guilty.

Another 20-miler for the books

The step up to 20 miles, the second longest run of the season, is a rough one.

It's the big 2-0. You're no longer in the teens. You're in the big leagues.

It's funny. I remember this as last season's most miserable run. I remember trying to leg out the last little bit with the 10:30s but feeling so tired that I just wanted to quit.

But my blog from the day says something different.

"Mentally I'm feeling great, race day is approaching very quickly and getting past 20 was a huge confidence-boost for the 26.2...

"...After the water stop at Mile 16 I dropped back with another girl in our group and we fell back to about an 11:30 pace. Two others that started early with us also ended up dropping back and we did our last three miles very slowly. We were all really hurting. It was a struggle to keep conversation going just to pass the time. 

"But that's ok, we got the time on our feet in, we did it, that's all that matters. And, when we got back to the school, there were all kinds of wonderful supportive people there to greet us."

The dynamics of the runs were the same too, in the sense that they came after really, really rough weeks.

But this time, I felt great for the entire run.

The beginning was the same as every other long run. Things were achy and my mind couldn't wrap itself around the fact that my legs had so much more to go. The mental block would have hit if it weren't for the people around me.

And, as usual, I settled in. At the midway point I was feeling strong, and with 6 miles to go I felt like pushing myself a little further. Perfect timing, the 10:00 team was coming in the other direction so I jumped ship. Another 10:30 sped up with me, and since our distances were off from the 10s we ended up doing the last 2 on our own. We kicked it up to a 9:30 pace and ended up with an average of 10:15.

Time and heart rate splits:
Mile 1: 10:47, 164 bpm
Mile 2: 10:41, 154 bpm
Mile 3: 10:40, 152 bpm
Mile 4: 10:42, 160 bpm
Mile 5: 10:21, 155 bpm
Mile 6: 10:07, 155 bpm
Mile 7: 9:46, 158 bpm
Mile 8: 10:19, 158 bpm
Mile 9: 10:23, 157 bpm
Mile 10: 10:25, 156 bpm
Mile 11: 10:29, 156 bpm
Mile 12: 10:15, 160 bpm
Mile 13: 10:10, 164 bpm
Mile 14: 10:18, 167 bpm
Mile 15: 10:15, 164 bpm
Mile 16: 10:06, 166 bpm
Mile 17: 10:12, 169 bpm
Mile 18: 10:26, 167 bpm
Mile 19: 9:29, 171 bpm
Mile 20: 9:03, 175 bpm

Bring it, Columbus!!!

After 18 miles, total exhaustion

At the beginning of the year, I didn't understand people who told me "I can't train for a marathon, I have kids." What's the big deal? At the worst of it, you're gone for 4 hours on a Saturday morning. With MIT starting so early, you're probably home by the time they wake up.

Then came the first 16-miler. I reeled for a few hours, then crashed. When I woke up, I had some of the worst soreness and exhaustion I had ever experienced. After that run, then my 18, 20, 22 and my race, I was out for the entire weekend. Anything that required the slightest bit of exertion was out of the question.

Parents who train for marathons (or those who have any other obligations on the weekends), how do you do it? Throwing the red ball to my dog takes special effort! Any chore I can't do sitting down can wait!

Yesterday I was scheduled for 16. I, errr, went 18. It was a great run, I felt really strong through the entire thing. Staying on my feet for so long after was probably a bad call. I did some shopping (pair 4 of Mizuno Precisions on their way!). Then I went to the 10TV Health and Fitness expo, which was a huge waste of time.

I had really good splits and my heart rate stayed where it needed to be:

My average pace was 10:20, average HR was 155. Splits:
Mile 1: 10:53, 171 bpm (doubt this is right, monitor was acting up)
Mile 2: 10:26, 164 bpm
Mile 3: 10:27, 152 bpm
Mile 4: 10:20, 152 bpm
Mile 5: 10:29, 149 bpm
Mile 6: 10:28, 150 bpm
Mile 7: 9:09, 149 bpm
Mile 8: 9:37, 154 bpm (potty break and subsequent catch-up)
Mile 9: 10:20, 149 bpm
Mile 10: 10:27, 150 bpm
Mile 11: 10:33, 149 bpm
Mile 12: 10:12, 153 bpm
Mile 13: 10:25, 153 bpm
Mile 14: 10:18, 152 bpm
Mile 15: 10:18, 155 bpm
Mile 16: 10:26, 158 bpm
Mile 17: 10:30, 162 bpm
Mile 18: 10:37, 159 bpm

Anyway, aside from the laundry that I absolutely need to do, my only mission for the rest of the evening is to find out if Jack Bauer can stop the pandemic virus in time! Netflix, I love you.

Song I'm currently obsessed with:

Nostalgia

Our run Feb. 5.

Today was the first 12-mile run of the season. It started to rain/snow toward the end and I could literally feel bits of ice bouncing off my face...


Oh wait... that's just what I was longing for... weather like that on Feb. 5 when we were in the same point in our training for our spring marathons. Seems like forever ago!


Today was a far different story. Accuweather had a giant heat advisory for the entire day. The started us out early, at 6:30 (which put my wake-up call at 4:45), and even then the humidity was around 90 percent.


I've never done well in the heat. Thanks to the MIT coaches, though, I was prepared for today. They sent us emails all week about dealing with the humidity. Here are some of the things I did:

• Drank lots and lots and lots of water yesterday and this morning 
• Brought extra nutrition (for 12 miles I used a Gu and a pack of Sport beans)
• I've been eating bananas all week
• Extra carbs and salt yesterday
• I made sure to stand outside to get acclimated before running
• Wore my monitor and kept an eye on my heart rate the entire time
• Dumped cups of water on myself at the water stops.

I survived! The first two miles were the toughest (and also uphill), but then I settled in on the shady trail. I've been struggling with shin splits lately, they hurt the first two but then eased off. After I changed I wrung my clothes out in the sink! Grossness! 

This was one of those days I definitely couldn't have survived without MIT and the 10:30 pace team. I know 12 miles was where I broke down trying to run on my own so for some reason I always get nervous before this run. 


(Why is this in a different font. Arg. Whatever, it's nap time, I'll fix it later.)

Slowing down for summer

There's a reason why I felt at home in Maine. I can't do in July what I did in December. I've now learned that lesson for the third week in a row.

Today was the first 10-mile run of the season with MIT. The first 3 miles with the 10:30s were absolutely horrid. I was achy, exhausted and the pace seemed much harder than usual. After the first water stop I decided to move back two pace groups and continued with the 11:30s. I felt like I was putting forth the same amount of effort that I usually do at 10:30.

That made all the difference. The aches and pains ceased almost instantly. The exhaustion was still there but not as bad.

This winter I survived subzero temperatures, ice storms and pouring rain, so I can say definitively that I'd take any of those above 90 degree weather!

Running at 11:30 was unbearable at first, after pushing a pace close to 9 for the past few weeks. I almost took off to rejoin my old group, but was stuck in the middle of the pack without a quiet way out. I grew acclimated to the pace and finished the 10 miles comfortably. (Continued after the jump.)

Urban Dare Columbus race report, and other musings

Life has kept me a little busy lately, in good ways, so this is going to be uncharacteristically short (as in -- here's what I can write while inhaling a hummus sandwich on my lunch break).

First up -- the Urban Dare Saturday. This was a fun event -- though it was more scavenger hunt, less dare. I did it with my buddy Jason. We had no idea what to expect when we got there, we were handed blue shirts to wear and told to await further instructions. There were about 80 teams.


First instruction: Run to the statue 20 feet away. That was easy. We got our other instructions -- all clues of places to go around downtown Columbus. In Columbus, I know where the statehouse is. And Einstein's bagels across from the statehouse. And... that's it.

Thanks to a glorious invention called the smartphone (I'm not cool enough for one, but Jason was) we got online and deciphered the clues, and plugged them into the GPS. They were all statues, restaurants and landmarks.

We got turned around a couple times, and almost ran 3 miles out of our way. We ended up having to run a mile back because we missed a landmark. We also had to stop a couple total strangers on the street and ask them to recreate this photo:

Beyond this, though, the "dares" were pretty pathetic. At most landmarks we just had to take a picture to prove we were there. At one we had to do a 3-legged race. At another we had to jump rope. Far from the rock climbing walls and stuff the event advertised! It was still a good day though.

The event was billed as 5-7 miles. I decided to be crazy and I went to MIT that morning and did 6 with Kim, and my hamstrings were screaming from Crossfit two days before. Thanks in part to my superior navigating skills, we ended up covering 9.3 (with lots of stops in between!). Our official time was 3:32 (there were many stops). Total was 15.3 miles for the day, giving me a 27 mile week, my highest since Cleveland.

I'll update later with some more links and stuff. In the meantime, a few other random musings:

Cosmetic surgery for 1000 MILES!!!

What, cosmetic surgery for my blog, of course!!

Today I hit 1,000 lifetime miles! 567 of those 1,000 miles were run this year. So, to celebrate, I figured I'd give my blog a facelift. I'm no web designer -- heck I always buy black skirts because I'm inept at coordinating my outfits each morning. But I don't think it came out too badly! I can't change the color of the Daily Mile gadgets so I just made the rest of my blog pink and orange to match. I changed the title and description too. REDUX!! Because I am now on my second go around! 

I'm also updating my blog roll, so if you would like me to link to you please let me know!

I was going to wait until the end of the month to do another numbers post, but since 1,000 is a monumental occasion, we'll do a bit now! The lifetime Daily Mile analytics:

Monthly mileage for the past year (I started running last May): 

Today was another great MIT run. I did seven miles with the 10:30s from Ohio Health in Westerville. We had a little storm delay, but then the run turned out to be very pleasant. It was MIT's 10th anniversary so they had a party at the store after the run. 

Summer is here, and 140 days until Columbus!

MIT, from Fleet Feet's Facebook page. 

I'm back! Did my first summer/fall training run with MIT this morning and it felt so great to be out there pounding the pavement in the sunshine with the 10:30s.

Who are huge this season, by the way! There are so many of us, it's fantastic! 

And the "long run"... a whopping 6 miles! Remember when I said this? Splits today were: 10:31, 10:14, 10:01, 10:10, 10:26, 9:57. 

Yea, yea, yea, I guess I remember saying this too :)

It's all relative. 

My alarm was buzzing at 6 a.m. and I was up and ready. I made a bagel and burned a CD for the ride since the iPod is still MIA. Getting ready to run in the summer is so much easier -- shorts, tech shirt, garmin, hydration, good to go! (continued)

Ramblings as race day approaches

10 days until my first marathon, and to say I'm terrified would be a vast understatement. All the crazy what-ifs are running through my head.

I have race bib # 1724.

(Warning: Whiny, rambling, most likely incoherent post ahead)

Here's what killed my confidence... I'm ashamed to say it but I dropped the ball on my training. Last week I finally got into my new apartment (which is wonderful) but it also meant that I didn't run for five days. The whole moving process was just so taxing and exhausting. Wednesday and Thursday were spent packing up the old place, Friday doing the physical move, Saturday asleep (literally, I could not move), Sunday cleaning the old place, Monday unpacking the new place. I'm messy and cluttered by nature, but on the same token I can't stand not knowing where things are (like my Garmin cable... arg!) So that has added a whole new layer of stress to my day to day routine. My rule is to spend one hour each day -- no more, no less -- working on the new place. It's a bit discouraging because while I'm making slow progress, and the essentials are done, there is still so much more to do.

My diet really suffered during the move too, I think I spent a total of five days without cooking a single meal. I lived off Lucky Bamboo, Wendy's salads and Chipotle.

I didn't have much choice but to move when I did. I actually lucked out -- for awhile it was looking like it would happen this coming weekend. Still, I wish I had eeked out a mile or two during the move. I'm sure there was some athletic value to basically being on my feet for 4 days, but still it killed the momentum I had from the 22-miler.

In general 2011 thus far has been a whirlwind of major changes (I think I like peanut butter now, for one, thank you Trader Joe's). My dogs, Gigi and Lizzie, are staying with my parents for another week -- they couldn't handle the stress of the move, so running has become my constant. Thus, a lot hinges on it, and when it goes, my sanity quickly follows.

And, oh, my apartment is going to be so awesome when it's complete! It's going to be a long process. I can't wait to get some cool curtains, have a dining room table I can actually eat at, a real TV hooked up to a Roku box, to actually hang my various wall hangings on my walls, maybe I'll even paint my walls something other than white, maybe I'll even get a new living room set. I'm going to love it, but the process is a slow one. I even have a little room off my living room that I can keep the few pieces of workout equipment I have. I'm thinking about getting the Insanity series -- I hear that's awesome for agility which would be great for fall trail races. But I'm getting a little ahead of myself.

So, to summarize: Last week I was a mess, but it was a means to a positive end. I'm doing much, much better this week. Monday I ran 4 and went to spin class. I felt like hell. Tuesday I did 5 on the treadmill and also did spin class. I felt great. They say to drop the cross training as race day approaches, but I find the spinning really helps my knees. I took today off, tomorrow is 6 and Friday is 4. I think I'm going to do my 8 on Sunday, then I'll look at the final week.

If there's one thing Jeff Henderson and Randy Olson have drilled into our brains this year in MIT it's to have a plan for race day and race weekend. So here it is (oh dear gawd it starts a week from tomorrow):

Thursday: Pack everything I can possibly think I might even need. Be ready to grab my stuff and go after work Friday.
Friday: Get off work, drive to Cleveland.
Saturday: Take it easy. Maybe get a massage. Hang out with the family. Watch Theresa Edwards run her first 5K, pick up my packet and race bib 1724, enjoy the expo.
Ok, that was the easy part.
Sunday: How early should I arrive? Ack, I don't know, the race starts at 7!!! At any rate, wake up at hotel Mom and Dad and awake one of the loving cab drivers for a ride downtown.
What I'm going to wear: My orange Mizunos, non-cotton socks, Under Armour compression tights, one of my good sports bras, pink tank top. One or two throwaway layers depending on the weather. I need to go to Fleet Feet to get something that says MIT on it that's not a shirt. If it's a hat, then I'll wear that, if not then I'll wear my Pearl Izumi visor. Headband. My Garmin and HRM.
What I'll bring: My Fuel Belt for the pockets, and my Amphipod water bottle. I'm going to bring 4 Gus, though I don't know if I'll need all of them. I'm going to Gu every hour, with maybe an extra if it's warm out. I'll keep my cell phone in the FuelBelt pocket -- normally I prefer not to run with it but I'll have some texting to do immediately after.
The strategy: It's a flat course, and I have hill trained, so I'm not worried about inclines. I want to finish in 4:45 or less. That's a 10:53 pace. I have trained at 10:30, but I need to consider that breaks are considered in the final time. I'm going to do the first six at an 11:00 pace, then speed up from there.
Breaks: I'll break every 4 miles for water, Gu and whatever else I need. Water stops are every 2 miles.
After: Find Gatorade. Find beer and an apocalyptic supply of any food I might be craving. Call cab Mom or Dad for a ride home. Sleep lots.

After the marathon: Do nothing for a week. I mean nothing. No activity beyond walking the animals. Recover completely. Eat liberally. The week after I'll start back lightly.

If I gain five pounds those weeks, I gain five pounds, plenty of time to work it off when MIT starts up again May 28 and I start training for Columbus :)

It's amazing how an hour's worth of blogging, Facebook chatting, 2 glasses of White Zin and oven fries can really change your outlook! I've got this! I'll sing my ode to MIT and all the other wonderful people racing May 15 in another post.

22 miles done, and time to taper

Today, I realized that the marathon is totally in the bag.

I had my 22-mile run with MIT. Toward the end, I was hurting, really hurting,  but ultimately I could have kept going for 4.2 more miles. And, coming off nearly 3 weeks of maintenance, I know I'll get it done.

In a backwards way I'm glad it was humid out. This was our first really humid run, so now I'll know I survived it come race day. Heck, we've had every other type of weather.

The run was fun, the coaches took shifts so the 3 of us running 22 had company the whole way. I remember getting a pit in my stomach at mile 8, realizing I was only halfway done. Mile 14-15 took us up and around OSU stadium so we had the fun distraction of watching the pre-game shenanigans. I started to feel really tired around Mile 18, Mile 19 felt like an eternity. After the last water stop we had 1.5 left, and somehow I found the energy to really push it in -- I think my brain and body wanted it to be done with.

22 miles in 3:49, average pace of 10:26. Splits were: 10:52, 10:27, 10:47, 10:37, 10:32, 10:34, 9:03, 10:02, 10:29, 10:19, 10:34, 10:28, 10:32, 11:17, 10:44, 10:29, 10:53, 10:26, 10:42, 10:26, 10:08, 9:15.

That gives me 44 miles for the week, my highest yet.

Maybe I'll update later with some more stats... I'm curious to see what my April total will be.

Hitting the big 2-0... Now, I feel better

Today, I got up at 4:30 a.m. and ran 20 miles. Mentally I'm feeling great, race day is approaching very quickly and getting past 20 was a huge confidence-boost for the 26.2. Physically, my legs feel pretty much like you'd expect them to feel after running 20 miles.

This week was also my first 40-mile week.

The Cleveland Marathon is now 35 days away. May 15. Just over a month from now.

Most of the full marathoners were going early so I sucked it up, woke up at 4:30, and was at Thomas Worthington at 6. The first 9 miles were very peaceful, we ran on the Olentangy Trail to the gazebo, up through Worthington Hills and back to the school. Worthington Hill wasn't that bad the first time. The fatigue started to hit as we went up the hill to the school.

We met up with the full 10:30 MIT crew at 8 back at the school and headed out again. Things were starting to get sore, but I was distracted for the next three miles because the whole group was with us and they, just starting out, had a lot of energy.  (continued)

Wet

Poor Mizunos.

Every Saturday MIT run has been an adventure. There was that day we went out in -2 degree weather, that day where ice pellets were bouncing off our faces, that day where the trail was too icy and we had to rough it up all those hills instead, etc...

And today: Water water everywhere.

It was pouring rain, though that eased off toward the end. Some of the puddles were 50-75 feet long and 6" deep. We did 16 miles, which took us all the way to OSU then back to Thomas Worthington High. My shoes and tights were caked with mud at the end. Our pace coach, Randy, suggested that we loosen the shoe up all the way and stuff it with newspaper, so that's what I did.

Despite the nasty blisters on my feet, I had a lot of fun today. The last two miles were really hard, thanks to my team for pushing me through. I started to make myself crazy checking my garmin all the time, so for the last 4 I tucked it under my jacket sleeve and made myself ignore it.

Edit: My splits were: 11:52, 10:18, 10:57, 10:58, 10:31, 10:16, 10:27, 10:41, 10:33, 10:34, 10:50, 10:47, 11:25, 10:32, 10:33, 10:02

I actually got a second pair of shoes Friday, Zoot's, that I can't wait to try out. Hopefully I'll get out in them for recovery Monday then I'll do another post.

I'm starting to settle in to a new Saturday routine that I love. (continued)

Reward for getting out of bed

I am so glad I got out there this morning, and I survived 14 miles to boot. My body was screaming at me when I got up, the same dehydration/achiness/headaches/sniffles that I've had all week. Normally I run with the 10:30s, today I started with the 11s and felt pretty horrid the first two miles. At the first water stop I dropped back to the 11:30s and then I started feeling better.

I noticed yesterday in spin class and the two miles I ran that my heart rate was way up, so I tried to pay attention to that today. My average was around 140 -- that's usually where I am at a 10:30 pace so I'm glad I dropped back. I missed the people I've gotten to know in the 10:30s, but the 11:30s were a very enjoyable group to run with.

The weather was nice, cold but not too cold. We were on the streets of Worthington, as opposed to the trail, so it was very hilly. My legs are rudely informing me that they did not appreciate the inclines.

The long run is 16 next week and 18 the week after. The next week is a taper week at 10, and I'm doing Conquer the Creek in Columbus.

I ended up with 24 miles this week, not bad -- all things considered. (continued)

Freakishly springlike and loving it

On Wednesday, I ran in short sleeves. On Friday I ran in shorts. What a wonderful week in Central Ohio! It was a little colder today, but still a great day to be out.

This week was a fallback, 10 miles, and that did seem short compared to last week's 15 miler. The next 3 weeks are 14-16-18, yelp yelp yelp! I thought we were going a little fast but we ended with an average pace of 10:20.

755 calories burned on the run. 1150 consumed at Panera after (what happens when you say yes, I will take a delicious chocolate chip cookie for $0.99). Hear that, Panera? You won... this time.

Fleet Feet actually got a halfway decent picture of me... stole this from their Facebook page (I'm in blue):

(continued)

Winter warriors (and 30 miles in one week)

Last week I finally hit 30 miles for one week! That's with the CRRC Winter Run Sunday, which was half of it. Here's the graph for last week:

I'm looking at a few events prior to Cleveland. I probably will only do one, two max. I'm dying to get off-road (and by that, I don't mean on the treadmill). This looks like a fun one... The Great Seal Trail Run March 26 in Chillicothe. But I don't think it will fit in too well with my training schedule, I either have to do 18 or 20, depending on if I am still following the Cincy schedule or if I am following Cleveland's by that point.

A perfect fit would be the Earth Day Challenge half marathon in Gambier April 17, when I have 12 scheduled. I'm not sure if it's an actual trail run or a paved trail.

This week my training will be a little off because I did my long run Sunday instead of Saturday. Tomorrow I'm taking off, for obvious reasons. I'm going to shoot for a slow 4 Tuesday, 6 Wednesday, 6 (hills) Thursday, and a slow 4 Friday. (continued)