October: In Which I "Complete" My 1st FULL Marathon

I began October knowing that I was going to be on complete rest and that PT was on hold for the time being. Then I completed my first full marathon a few days later. I had been mentally preparing myself for about a month that I wouldn't be able to run it and was resigned to the idea of walking just part of it and not finishing. I was trying to get excited but wasn't really feeling it. But we had planned a whole weekend....so we went anyway.

I planned to only walk a few miles and then bow out. I ended up walking the entire thing. I am a finisher. Boo ya! Perhaps because I was walking in honor of this guy....

Army Command Sgt Major Kevin Griffin, KIA 8/8/12

 I packed with only walking a little bit in mind and didn't prepare for the day at all. I ended up incredibly hot, in the wrong clothes, ill prepared to fuel my body and sunburned. But I did it.

We did the whole 26.2 miles taking turns carrying the flag. Every step was worth it and I am so glad I ended up doing it. I also think not deciding till the last minute helped me actually complete it. It felt so surreal the whole time and I didn't ever really get a chance to freak out about walking that many miles with no training. Or preparation of any kind, really.

Overall, I loved the Portland Marathon and there's a very good chance I'll be back for a rematch next year....And this time I will run it, I'll knock hours off my time and I won't feel quite so horrible the whole week afterwards.

Total Miles for October: 26.2

Training. New Plan. It's On.

Alrighty. It's time. Focus is officially switching to full marathon training. Which, truthfully, has sort of gotten lost in all this Ragnar relay madness. In exactly 9 1/2 weeks (ha!), I'll be running my first 26.2 in Portland. And I'm behind. Officially, but not irretrievably.

Ragnar wasn't the only thing that threw me and my training off this month. I was averaging about 100 miles/month since March but only did 60 in July due to my pulled butt muscle. There was a couple weeks of self-imposed total rest and a lot of the runs were cut short. Which means that I have quite a bit of ground to make up. I've been back to somewhat normal this week so far. I've run three days in a row, just my short 3.5 mile loop and I'm feeling ok. Received the Stick I ordered this week and have been putting it to good use. Seems to be helping a bit. It's hard to tell if the ohmygodimgonnadie feeling is mostly coming from the injury or the fact that I am having to do some serious make-up fitness. Probably both.

I've revamped the training schedule yet again....it still feels a bit ambitious for how I'm feeling...but I'm going to slog through for the next couple of weeks and see how it goes, while I simultaneously go through the rig-a-marole for finding a PT and navigating through my insurance requirements. Fun times. I had lofty goals for this cycle. I was going to go all out and really up my weekly mileage...and not just for the weekend long runs. Pre-injury plan had me running a full 26 a few weeks before PDX and was fairly aggressive in the weekly increase. I've dialed it back a bit.....still planning on trying for a full 26 during training but it meant getting to that point in less time than anticipated.

And going from an average of 25 miles a week to peaking around 45 will be a challenge. But it's time. Over the course of this year, I've built up to a good weekly plan that keeps me in 'half shape'....which to me means that I could do a half tomorrow if I wanted to, without doing anything different to prepare. Training like that got me through a very fun series of half marathons this spring and my regular Ragnar Relay. But now it's time to raise the level of both the training and my game.

I've never run more than 13.1 miles before. Next weekend, I'm tackling 15 for the first time. And it only goes up from there.....It will be fun to come up with some new routes, and add on to some of my existing favorites to make them longer. Maybe when I get up to the high teens, low 20's, I can do a crazy loop incorporating my two favorite long run routes - the Seattle waterfront to the Magnolia Bridge and the Madison to Lake Washington loop.

Also, take a look at the plan for Ragnar in November! Totally makes me want to vomit. But I'm ready. It's time to work on the mental game, b/c this is about to get 'real'....

June: In Which I Run the Rock and Roll with Wear Blue

Incredible month. Almost kept up with the mileage from last month...almost. 100.9 miles.

June was busy, very busy. I started the month out by making some changes around here. Still planning to do some tweaking, but things got really busy in a hurry after my initial tinkering. I made some tweaks to my training schedule, both before and after the Rock and Roll to accommodate the Ragnar Relay. I also did my schedule for my first full marathon....getting ahead of even the all important registration part!

You know what happens around this time of year? Besides school ending and summer starting, etc, etc. Mid year check ins on the goals and progress for the year. I am doing pretty well against my 2012 goals....pretty proud of my progress actually.

I did a new route along the waterfront and took some pictures...It ended up being a lot of fun, despite feeling all touristy.

The end of the month brought a graduation and my first Rock and Roll (half) Marathon. My girl officially graduated from middle school...*sniff sniff. I am old, right? Now that my kid is going to high school? Gahhhh....

Game On!

We ran with Wear Blue and it was a most extraordinary experience. I ran in honor of Capt. John Hallett, and the soldiers from 1-17 Infantry Battalion of the 5^th Stryker Brigade Combat Team out of Ft. Lewis. The Battalion and Brigade lost 41 soldiers during the yearlong deployment, and saw over 200 soldiers severely injured; twenty-three of those casualties came from 1-17.

 Wear Blue Run to Remember

It was my favorite race by far. Loved every minute of it. You can read all about the best part here and the full recap here. Can't wait to do it again next year....But I will rock the full this time.

Finally, I closed out the month on a runner's high and registered for my first FULL marathon-- Portland on October 7, 2012. Game on!

Training Schedules

I've been slaving over this masterpiece....my training schedule for my first Full Marathon this fall. I've already planned out to the Ragnar Relay, factoring in the back to backs I'll be doing so I don't die out there. Which meant I slightly tweaked the schedule in the run up to the Rock and Roll on June 23rd.

Only three week out until RnR. I'm starting to get pretty excited. I was focusing on all the races in the summer and beyond and haven't really given this one all that much thought. It will be fun to run that one with Wear Blue and some of my Ragnar teammates. So between now and then, I've got a couple back to backs and will start transitioning back to morning runs to beat the heat (haha, relatively speaking at least).

Post RnR, I'll be focusing on Ragnar for a few weeks and then boom- it's time to start training for my full. I've probably got a little tweaking to do once I start living it. And I was actually pretty torn for a bit on how many days per week I should run for this but feel like I've got a good solid plan. I started by pluging in all the variables to Smart Coach on Runner's World and got a good base schedule. From there, I decided on how my long runs would progress from 13.1 to 26. I am big believer in tackling the full amount during training. There are a lot of plans that have you stop short around 20 but I'm not down for that. I want to do the full amount, every single sweat drenched, tear stained mile at least once so I don't die during the race. But anyway, I built the long runs, progressing about 10% a week until taper week. Rounded out the total, peaking at about 45 miles a week.

From there, I plugged in shorter runs throughout the week, sticking with Wednesdays alternating between tempo and speed workouts. I have been doing 5 days a week for about 6 months now, so I felt comfortable sticking with that. But the total daily mileage isn't a huge difference from what I've been doing. So that means, I'll be only really killing my body on a weekly basis on increasing the long run. And that will be enough really. To be perfectly honest, I'm a little scared of running anything longer than 13 miles. But I'll get there. As they say, you've got eat the elephant one bite at a time.