I have to say that this past week was my favorite of training so far. The weather was incredible and I had some great 6 mile runs to the gym. I’ve been running the three miles there relatively quick (7:45 pace) and then running back at a slower pace (8:45). I want to work on my speed, but also be realistic about my marathon goal pace.
Had an amazing spin class on Wednesday evening where I was just in the zone and feeling real strong. Also did a couple good hours of strength training spread out throughout the week and made sure to get in at least an hour of stretching/ab work every day.
Sunday I was hoping to do an 18 mile run, but like always went into it expecting my knee to start hurting way before then. But for whatever reason everything just came together perfectly and it ended up being my best long training run yet. I did about 3 laps of my normal aboretum/pond route adding an extra lap or two around the pond here and there. Once I was approaching 15 miles I was still feeling great and had hardly any knee pain. I decided to just go for it and ended up doing 20 miles! Still felt great at the end of the run and more than anything it made me confident that I can definitely get through 26.2
Something about running 20 miles was really empowering to me. I’ve had such a frustrating few months of training that my expectations of these long runs are always pretty low, always thinking in the back of my mind that my knee won’t hold up and I’ll have to quit. But conquering 20 miles in 3:06 made me feel so good. I have been so determined overcome this knee injury and now to actually see real, true progress is the best thing that I could hope for. I have a renewed sense of confidence in what I can accomplish if I truly work for it. Can’t wait to get back out there and run again tomorrow.
