National Marathon Training week 18

This is the last big week before the taper begins. I'm a little nervous as my last big run was not so good, and then I got sick so my next 20 miler was actually 0. Coming off of coach bubba I started feeling a bit better so my confidence is growing.

Monday: 5 miles
5 mile easy recovery run. It was cold, very cold, like 28 degrees in the morning when I went out. usually when I wear my thick running gloves, they come off after 1 mile, but today it was mile 3. I took it easy and stayed in zone 3 except for the big hill at mile 4, and then I did my 5 x 100 meter strides at the end.

Tuesday: 8 miles
today's track workout was 1 mile warmup, 3 x 2 miles at just under marathon pace, 1 mile cool down. I decided to do 2 x 3 miles instead to make it go by faster. Felt pretty good on these, my hr was hovering right around zone 4, and I would prefer it to be 3.8, but as my hip and legs felt good the whole time and just zoned out on the heavy metal it was alright.

Wednesday: swim 1.2
Did a little bit harder swim today than usual, but still felt good and worked on my breathing technique and keeping my legs up.

Thursday: 6 miles
I had an easy 6 miles today, so I ran down harrison to black creek, at the point where I would turn back for the 4 mile loop I just kept going for another mile and back and made 6. kept hr low except on the hill back up to harrison. Felt good on the hills and hips and legs still feeling good. Friday is off and my confidence is growing, but still Saturday looms and now it's going to be rainy and cold. oh joy.

Friday:
day off

Saturday: 20 miles
on the plan was 22 miles at comfortable pace. This one could get a little wordy since it was a really long run. Friday comes along and the forecast for the weekend is 50 degrees and steady rain all day long saturday. I'm thinking maybe sunday this week, but then I look at sunday and it's 30's and rain all day, so back to Saturday. So I wake up Saturday morning, eat breakfast and start to get ready. The phone rings and it's downstairs, but I know it's Erin, calling to say she is not going. I get the phone mail, and it's Erin, saying she is not going. So I call her back and tell her I am going anyway and it's ok that she isn't going. She tries to convince me to go tuesday, but I am so ready to get this over and start tapering and it's really only 4 hours out of my life and I need to be done so I can have the next 21 days to rest and get ready. Anyway she changes her mind and is going to go. We start off and head towards umstead from north cary park, the first few miles not so good but then we get to the airport overlook and things level off and I start feeling a bit better. We loop around and head up the spill way, my favorite hill, only had to walk once, then at the top we head to the rest rooms for a quick pit stop before heading down harrison. Next we turn down ready creek to cary cafe, pick up an extra mile in the cary slums behind the cafe and then head down harrison to pick the greenway back up. Things are still going good when we hit dynasty and take a nice walk break up the mean hill, then decide to loop back to maynard via sudbury to get two more miles in so we don't have to go back up to the airport overlook. We run until we get back to the mean hill on dynasty, then run back to north cary park. Now we are on mile 16 and once again my legs/feet start the normal after 16 revolt so I give Erin the key and send her on her way. After the turn around at the gate, i am resigned to walk 30 seconds, run to the next 1/4 mile post, then walk 30 seconds, until I reach the 20 mile mark and then I am done. This run didn't really help my confidence as it was at 11 min pace so I am hoping the taper and rest will help, but have already started lowering my expectations and questioning if I am really cut out to do marathons. I guess part of the draw for me is the fact that it is such a challenge, but I was really hoping this time I might be able to get to the point where 18 - 20 didn't just kill me and make me suffer as much.

Sunday:
standard sunday swim except legs are really sore and lower back not feeling good. Did my swim and some stretching in the pool then got out to start my birthday...

weekly miles: 39