Training Recap: Week 14, Jan 09 - 15

Well, since this experience of marathon training is new to me, you can be sure that there are going to be lots of personal records and milestones achieved. It really does feel good (no joke)! This week was no different. I set a personal distance record for the week (53 miles) and for one individual training run (18 miles)! I'm planning another personal distance record in 2 weeks (20 miler!) and the ultimate ecord (for me) on April 16th!

Here is how this week went day by day:
M: 4.4mi default aerobic pace planned, but pushed final two miles in the 6:30s/mi. Sometimes I just can't control that urge to get to the finish line (see Saturday!)

T: 8mi tot: ~7mi default aerobic pace + 6x 150m strides at the end

W: 10mi recovery run in about 1:14, 7:15/mi overall.  Also was hampered by another night of poor sleep due to tendon pain in my finger. It strikes only before 10 mile runs apparently (just like last weekend). Oh well.


T: Monster tempo run 8.5mi tot: warmup + 16x {400m "on", 200m recover}, cooldown. The 400m tempo runs were done at 1/2 marathon, 10K, 5K, and 3K effort (repeated 4x in that order). Our goal paces were: 1/2 marathon (6:31/mi), 10K (6:10), 5K (5:57), 3K (5:40.8).  However, my split paces looked roughly like this: 6:45/mi, 6:20, 6:03, 6:00. I'll take it!

F: off

S: 18.1mi in 2:12 (7:18/mi overall)! This one was supposed to be done slower. Joe, Will and I set out early but it didn't take long before I got this internal "drive" to push at a little bit faster pace. Well before you know it I'm out there on my own pushing ahead. I just went with it and ended up with 13 out of the final 14 miles (and the final 11 miles in a row) run at a faster pace than I would need to qualify for Boston 2013 (7:26/mi).  Wow! And sorry boys I'll try to behave myself in the future!

S: 4.5mi recovery pace in 3 degrees temperature! Luckily no real wind to speak of. But when it's that cold you pretty much have to throw everything in your outdoor running gear wardrobe at it (and I did)!

Summary after 9 weeks of training for Boston: