Sunday, February 19, 2012

Marathon training

For those of you that don't know I am currently training to run my first full marathon. That's 26.2 miles for any readers that may not also be runners. I can't really tell you what week of training I am in since this was kind of a last minute decision.

Let me explain. See I made the decision late in the fall of 2011 that I was going to run a marathon in 2012. My plan was to PR the race that was my first half marathon in 2011, the Covenant Health Knoxville Marathon. But somewhere early this year (yes, I realize it is only Feb) my friend says to me, "Are you sure you don't want to run that as a full?" yes, I am sure. So, I made the decision to run the Atlanta Marathon in October of this year.

Then I started the training plan thinking that I would just repeat each week a couple of times to see how I felt and by the fall I would be more than ready to tackle the marathon. But once I started adding more miles to my week and my weekly long runs became longer I changed my mind. With a little encouragement from friends I decided that I wasn't going to wait. Why wait? Why train through the hot, humid East TN summer for a marathon when I could train through the rest of winter and early spring? It wasn't a tough decision at all.

The week I ran 14 miles I felt great and more confident that each week I could reach the next mileage goal. After last week's half marathon in the freezing temps, crazy wind and snow I felt even better. I had PR'd by 9 minutes from my last half marathon and 19 minutes better than my first. I was on cloud 9.. I still am! This week the training plan called for 16 miles.

I admit that my emotions regarding the run were up and down all week. I went from being confident to doubtful to excited to nervous and everything in between. My friend, Terri, was out of town running a 50 mile trail ultramarathon, the group training run wasn't quite the distance I needed and I wasn't familiar with the area/trail they were running so I wasn't sure about going over for that, and the thought of running 16 miles solo was intimidating! Thankfully I have many fabulous running friends that I have met through the blog, Daily Mile and the local track club! One of these great running friends had an 18 mile training run of her own and we had talked about getting together to run. SCORE! She and I made plans to get together on my local greenway to run.

I was still nervous. Friday night I had spent 2 hours standing at a Girl Scout cookie booth with the troop I am leader of, my monthly visitor had arrived and that seems to always wreak havoc on my running and stomach! Lucky me. I had never ran with M before and kept worrying about slowing her down. Thankfully we discussed pace before we met up. We decided to run at a 10:15 pace for our long run. Or let me say that was our goal! Seems I have a slight problem these days with running slow at least to start. My legs get going and I feel good and for whatever reason I guess I'm in the groove and sometimes no matter how hard I try I cannot scale back. We plan to work on that next week though! I know I can't carry that pace an entire 26.2 miles!

So, Saturday morning the plan was for me to go and get in a couple of miles before M arrived at our destination. I had another 2 hours cookie booth planned for 1pm. Yay! I was running late and managed to only get in one mile before M arrived. We were on our way within a few minutes of her getting there.

It was a beautiful day. The weather was perfect. Sunshine and I believe it was around 45 degrees, give or take a few. M told me beforehand that she would chat my ear off. I was only slightly worried about this as I am usually never very chatty when I run. Terri and my husband have gotten use to my "uh huh, yeah, ok, right" answers when we run together. I'm not sure I told M this before but I did tell her I would do my best to be chatty back. Turns out we had a lot to talk about! This is huge for me because in the past I can only remember being able to reply with one word answers because I was almost always out of breath. I longed for the day when I could run and talk at a decent pace.

My Garmin connect and RunKeeper give a bit different info off my Garmin but I completed 16.69 miles yesterday in 2:49:31. Taking the info from RunKeper the splits for miles 1-4 are like so:
Mile 1: 10:03
Mile 2: 9:35
Mile 3: 9:40
Mile 4: 9:48

We decided to stop off at my gym to use the bathroom before we got too far down the trail. It was about another 6 miles or so before the next restroom and we decided to stop sooner rather than later. I was glad for this short potty break. We also took the time to drink a bit of water and have a "snack." I think the timing was pretty good for both of us especially since we at a pace a bit faster than we had planned.
The next few miles went by well. We basically just chatted and ran which was really nice. M and I only met officially recently after talking through the blog, MFP and DM for a while. We "met" in passing too on a training run a few weeks ago and chatted a bit after the run but hadn't gotten a chance to really talk and get to know each other better before Saturday's run. I enjoyed it a lot.

The splits for miles 5 through 8 are:
Mile 5: 9:47
Mile 6: 9:17
Mile 7: 10:17
Mile 8: 10:36
We stopped again around mile 8-8.5 because I needed a brief potty break again. I was worried even with having taken a couple of Immodiums that my stomach may decide to give me fits. This is something I am just honest with myself and my fellow awesome running buddies because like I told M, "it just happens and I've learned to keep it real and joke about it so it doesn't kill me!" haha Thankfully most of my running buddies understand!
The route we were taking took us to a loop that would give us 10 miles which would cut off the first couple of miles of our run since we wouldn't have to retrace our steps the first few miles. We knew we would be a little over the miles I needed to cover but close enough once we got to the car that it wasn't going to be too far that M had to go to finish her 18.

Miles 9-14 are:
Mile 9: 10:07
Mile 10: 10:09
Mile 11: 10:01
Mile 12: 10:21
Mile 13: 10:52 (We had come to a part of trail the county has closed off due to draining the pond to make it safer for wildlife..or something. I haven't completely read up on this. It took me a minute to decide which way we should go! lol So this mile was slower)
Mile 14: 10:23

As smart as I am, I didn't run with enough water(Nuun) and forgot at my last bathroom stop to fill up my bottle. Around here the county shuts off the water fountains during the winter. LAME! But I get it. Luckily around mile 14 or so we came to one water fountain that was on! We both took the opportunity to drink up and have a snack again. I think I drank 2 bottles of water and filled up one to take with me. M asked several times how I was feeling on the run and I felt great. After we got to mile 15 (which was now my longest distance) she asked how I felt, "Pretty good. I mean I'm sore but that's running, right!?" And she agreed. We also agreed to again try to pull back and sow down a bit.

About mile 15 my phone buzzed, so I checked it. It was a text from my husband, "What are you doing?" haha M and I had a good laugh for a few minutes. He knew I was running but wasn't sure if I was done yet. I text back, "One more mile." I didn't check my message back from him until the car but it read, "Go get it!" Anyway, as M and I were running we joked that I should tell him I was getting a pedicure or eating bonbons and watching my shows! LOL I admit the pedicure sure sounded better than running a bazillion miles but I wouldn't feel nearly as good after the pedicure as I would after the run. That may sound crazy but for me it's totally true! I haven't had a pedicure in almost a year but my feet have logged a heck of a lot of miles. I'll take the miles any day!!

We both got quiet the last couple of miles. M said her and her friend refer to the last few miles as the "don't speak to me miles." I thought this was kind of funny but it really is almost totally true. It's like the last few miles you know you can do it but it's very much mental so there is a lot more focus on just getting there and being done. I'm not sure it makes total sense the way it's coming out but I know there are some of you that will get it. As much of a great run as it was I did want it to be done just so I could say, I did do it! I went for what I had to do.

Miles 15 and 16 plus.
Mile 15: 10:35
Mile 16: 10:38
Mile 17: 10:37 (it was actually only .69 miles)

Like I said, my Garmin and RunKeeper pull different info/splits and I'm really too lazy to plug the Garmin back in and pull from it so this is the info off RunKeeper since I was already logged in there! They're neither one far off from the other but I do notice a difference.

Overall I felt great after the run. I did some stretching in the parking lot before getting in my car. I headed to my gym for a quick shower and then off to stand for 2 hours at a cookie booth.

I was very very thankful again to have such an amazing running buddy there for me. I needed M yesterday for my 16 miler as much as she needed me and that is a great feeling. Completing another mileage milestone feels great and having M there to encourage me along the way was a huge help. I'm confident that I can succeed in the coming training weeks as well as on marathon day! I've been asked by a few friends today about how I feel? It's totally weird to not feel like I have been hit by a truck after such a long run. I ended up going to bed very early last night but woke up feeling refreshed and so far my joints and muscles aren't ready for me to call it quits! So, that I believe is success!

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