16 miles? 18 miles? 20 miles? 22 miles? Once you get to 20 miles, is 22 really that much of a difference? Here's what I told the lady who I ran with in our Leggers training run Saturday. The first 2 and last 2 miles are the hardest. Really. It takes a while to get into a groove, and then well, you yearn to reach the destination so you can fall out of that groove. There are tough spots along the way, sure. But by then, you have already committed.
I had a good run. We started a little fast, got a little slow, and then finished with about a 12:11 pace on average. Supposedly, we should train at a slower pace than the one we intend for the marathon. I like my pace group, they are good peeps, so I had no intention of switching it up. But now that I have finished the run, I'm thinking that I should probably aim for a pace a little bit faster than a 12 minute mile. So for the Pasadena Marathon, I think I will aim for 8 minutes less than the estimated 5:15 (time for 12 minute/mile).
Something else I told the lady I was running with (so sorry forgot your name - although I do remember our discussion about you running a 50 miler in Catalina with a couple of Mountain Goats) was that although we started with about 30 people, we would probably end with 5. And guess what? We did! Everyone else came in eventually, not that far behind.
I also signed up for the Firecracker 10K the week after the Pasadena Marathon. I did the Firecracker 5K in 2008 and this is one big hill of a course. So I decided to do the 10K - More hill. Good training for LA.
Happy running!
I was at the very last water station in Playa del Rey. So, you're doing the Pasadena marathon? I've been debating doing that, as there's a 26-mile Legger run the day before. If I'm going to run 26 miles, it might as well be a race.
ReplyDeleteI am! I did the 5K last year. It rained for the marathon portion. Hopefully it won't rain again this year. I'm looking forward to it and a lot of Leggers are doing it.
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