End Training Week 4

Okay, so I totally lied last week when I said I was ready for the marathon now. This wasn't a horrible week by any means but it definitely showed me that I am not quite marathon ready. Hopefully the taper will take care of that. As of tomorrow I've got 3 weeks. I've done my homework; so come race day, I hope, this should be evident.

Sunday: Rest day

Monday: 8 miles. I forgot to charge Garmin but I am guessing somewhere around an 8:30ish pace.

Tuesday: 4 miles in 29 minutes and 9 seconds on the treadmill. 35 minutes of full body weights.

Wednesday: 10 miles but Garmin's GPS was taking a nap for most of the run so I didn't get a pace. Time was a little over an hour twenty.

Thursday: Okay, so my plan was to try and do 18-20 but again GPS was taking a nap. I really needed it during this run since I had to pick up Beau and it was a new route. So little over 7 miles in I turned back. It ended up being somewhere around 14 miles in just over 2 hours.

Friday: Again with the treadmill. And again almost identical run: 29 minutes and 14 seconds. So slower. I started to do some upper body work but realized I didn't have time since Carmella had early release from school. So I only did about 10 minutes of arms and shoulders.

Saturday: 20 miles in 3 hours. This was much harder than I thought it would be. I started out on my regular route and planned to incorporate some new roads. I did not like the first new road. It was very hilly, much hillier than it seemed in the car when I drove it the other day. (If you haven't figured it out yet I do not love the hills.)
At the 10 mile point my feet hurt and I had stomach cramps. So I decided to cut it short and not try out the other new roads. Even still heading back at that point in my route would have made the run somewhere around 15-16 miles.
While I was cursing myself for giving up I realized I was feeling a little better and that my feet weren't bothering me so much anymore. I decided to loop back and add on a few extra miles so I could get to 20.
I basically spent the morning running in circles.
I hate that.
I absolutely hate running on the same road more than once. I like planned routes that have long loops. For some reason this makes me feel like I have a purpose. And I like, even better, point to point routes. I like these because I pretend that I am delivering an important message. Really, don't even bother asking me, there is no message. It is just the idea of the message. I guess I like to make myself all important and pretend that I am a modern day Phidippidies and I have a purpose. A method to my madness.
It is totally gay, I know.
Anyway, today though there was definitely no important message and I was certainly not Phidippidies: I ran through/past the same 4-way stop 3 times. I just felt silly out there--like I was lost and just kept missing the turn I needed. I had no purpose.

Oh yeah, and this morning, weirdness when I started out: I swear I saw at least 6 different police cars in the span of 2 miles along this one road on my route. One of them actually crept along side me. The officer driving had his window down and it kind of freaked me out since he seemed to be looking directly at me. So I asked him if we were racing. He and his partner chuckled a little and said yes. I told them they were sure to win and then kept running. They crept along with me for another minute and then finally drove on. Then they passed me 2 more times on that same road--both times they were laughing at me. I started to get a little paranoid and worried that maybe I had a pair of Carmella's tights stuck on my shirt like did once before because I failed to thoroughly check myself for static cling before heading out. I stopped a bit later for a pit stop and inspected myself in the mirror. I couldn't find anything laughable--I mean out of the ordinary for me-- so maybe they weren't laughing at me after all. Who knows. I didn't see any police cars the rest of my run so I don't what was up with that. It was weird.

At any rate, while it wasn't the greatest training run ever it was okay. And that is fine. It doesn't have to be great; it is a training run. But the best news is that I am officially done with the monster long runs for this training cycle. I have the Silver Comet half marathon next Saturday and then I will be in taper madness. I am not exactly sure what my plan is for the next few weeks but I will definitely start cutting back on the mileage. I will probably try to keep the intensity up until the week before the marathon. I am also thinking a few yoga classes might be in order. I am feeling about as flexible as the Tin Man these days.

Total miles: 60