17 Weeks to the Sham!

Ran the local "Turkey 10 Miler" race yesterday. I was happy with my time, this being the first time I've run a competitive 10 mile race - I've run longer and run shorter, but never this exact distance. I finished in 1:33:31; which equates to a 9:21 pace over the 10 miles. I actually thought I would do about a 10 minute pace, so I'm good with the results.

Next weekend I'll bump my long run up to 12 miles. I've done 10 miles 4 out of the last 5 weekends, so I'm ready to move up. I've got seven weeks until the half marathon, and the last two weeks will be sort of a tapering off; so really five more "serious weeks". Which brings me to today's "lesson" - which is #12: "Don't Peak Too Early When Training". The build up to a marathon or even a half marathon should be a gradual one. Again, the long run of the week is the most important, this is the distance you want to gradually increase throughout your training period. If you reach your goal too soon, you'll need to maintain that distance (by and large) until your race. This could lead to injury or just plain burn out. I'm actually a little ahead of where I want to be for the half marathon, but that's because I initially started to training for a full marathon and changed my plans. Over the next five weeks I plan to run 12 miles at least twice, probably 3 times - the other 2 or 3 weeks will be "step back" weeks where I run a slightly shorter distance - like 8 or 10 miles.

This week of training will be a little tough since it's Thanksgiving. Our son is coming home from NYC and we have lots of stuff planned, so I'll need to squeeze me runs in whenever I can. Today's song of the blog is  "Hold on Tight to Your Dreams" by ELO.

Happy Thanksgiving!