Marathon Training: Weeks 10 & 11

Wow... I can't believe I only have 5 weeks of marathon training left.  It seems like just yesterday I was trying to decide if I REALLY wanted to do this... and now the moment is almost here.  Unbelievable!

Week 10 was during that awful week  So I only got in my Monday run and a longish run on Saturday.  I don't even have an exact time for my 9ish mile run I did that Saturday.  I had left my Garmin in my car, which was at the hospital with Micah.  And can we take a minute to talk about how weird it feels to run without my garmin after being so attached to it over the past months since I got it?  I was constantly checking my wrist to see nothing there.

Week 11 was more of the same as the week before it, but I was back to work and therefore back to my regular running routine.  At one point, I considered dropping down to the half, just because I know this is so time consuming and I want to be available to Micah and his family.  But he convinced me to go ahead and finish out my training- mainly because he wants me to get this whole "marathon" thing out of my system... ha!

Monday: We were scheduled to run a 5 mile progressive run.  Having been off for almost a whole week, I was feeling sluggish.  I did manage to push and mile 4 was 8:05.  It was a tough run, but it felt nice to be back in my routine.

Wednesday: Another 7 miles, this time with 5 miles of tempo in the middle.  I just couldn't get it in gear and my tempos were all right around 9:30.  I also had my first marathon training wipeout during this run.  I stepped off the sidewalk, and next thing I knew I was laying on the ground.  I got up and finished, it was only when I got home that I realized I had strawberries and bruises on my knees and a hole in my favorite running capris.  Oh well, it could have been worse!


Saturday: The elusive 20 miles... I went to bed Friday night super nervous about running 20 miles.  That just seems so... FAR. 

I met up with Carrie and Kala at 6:15, ran 5 miles back to the car and got some fuel.  Then we set out on 10 miles with the running buddies from church.  About mile 12, it started to get REALLY cold and drizzling.  I hadn't dressed for the temperature drop, so when we got back to the car at mile 16 I was freezing!  Honestly, at that point I would have stopped if Carried hadn't been there to push me on.

We took off on our last 4 miles.  The first mile was into the north wind and it was COLD.  After we turned, it wasn't as bad.  The sun had (somewhat) risen and the drizzle had stopped.  I was feeling really strong when we looked up and saw that a train was completely stopped on the tracks we needed to stop.  We quickly took a turn and went across the bridge under the tracks.  This made our mileage a little long, but I was so glad to be finished. 


Long Run #11: 20 Miles
Average Pace: 9:49
Total Time: 3:14:58

Mile #1:  10:04
Mile #2:  10:13
Mile #3:    9:48
Mile #4:    9:55
Mile #5:  10:02
Mile #6:    9:35
Mile #7:    9:40
Mile #8:    9:37
Mile #9:    9:40
Mile #10:10:08
Mile #11:  9:45
Mile #12:  9:33
Mile #13:  9:31
Mile #14:  9:49
Mile #15:  9:37
Mile #16: 10:23
Mile #17:  9:52
Mile #18:  9:35
Mile #19:  9:38
Mile #20: 10:24

I can't believe we're almost to the race taper point.  We've got 2 more weeks of hard training, then it's taper time.  Speaking of, I've got 7 miles EARLY tomorrow, so I should go to bed.