The 2015 Chicago Marathon was the worst race I've ever run in my life. I hit the wall at Mile 14 and, upon seeing my family at Mile 14, stopped and cried. I didn't want to do it anymore. I was done. What prompted me to slog through another 2 1/2 hours of running to finish just shy of 5 hours is still beyond my comprehension.
I didn't finish happy. I didn't finish strong. I finished and then sat on the ground for about 45 minutes before getting up to make the endless walk to my family, and a medical tent.
It was my 6th marathon and the worst race of my life, but there was one thing I walked out of it saying: You better believe there will be a #7.
The most logical place to return for #7 is Richmond, where I not only ran my fastest race, but the best race of my life. Richmond was magic and I'm hoping to channel some of that magic into year's marathon.
That being said, I didn't have a great start to training. I took the week off after Sea Wheeze, doing nothing other than a 2 mile shakeout run after watching the Olympic Men's Marathon because Meb blew me away and brought back all of those feelings from Chicago.
The rest of the week was tough. We got home from a trip to NJ at 11pm Sunday, Wednesday, I got up and took a flight to Raleigh for work. Thursday, my flight back to DC was delayed 2 1/2 hours and I didn't get home until 11:00. Then, we got up Friday morning, drove to NJ for the night and then spent 11 hours driving from NJ to CT back to NJ and then on to DC on Sunday. I did run during the week, but it wasn't the kick off to marathon training that I hoped and, as a result, here we are on Tuesday morning and I haven't run yet this week either.
Here's what the week looked like;
Monday: 4 miles, easy
Tuesday: 7 miles, hills (not easy)
Wednesday: 25 minutes of morning yoga and PT Exercises
Thursday: Skipped
Friday: 4 miles with 2 at marathon goal pace (target 9:09, actual 8:55, 9:05)
Saturday: Skipped.
Sunday: Skipped.
We were in Mystic, CT for my college roommates wedding. I was planning on doing 4 easy on Saturday when we got there and my long run Sunday morning, but it took us 5 hours to get there (should have been less than 3) and we barely had enough time to get ready for the wedding. Because of that, we left way earlier than originally planned on Sunday morning.
Total Mileage this Week: 15
I'm not going to beat myself up about this. I usually start training 16 weeks out, but dropped to 12 because I didn't want to alter my training plan for Sea Wheeze. I need to have a strong week this week to feel good moving into the next 11 weeks so that I feel calm and ready on race day.
Are you training for a fall race? Which one? How's your training going?
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