I have a long 23 miler planned tomorrow. I'm trying to get miles in now, but I also want to be careful. Therefore, I'm breaking the runs up into smaller, more manageable ones. Today, the plan was for just 2 runs of 6 miles each.
I didn't have work today, so I decided to run at noon. I planned to only run around my neighborhoods. The weather was kind of nice. It was still below freezing and slightly breezy, but at least sunny. I did wear a lightweight long sleeve shirt under my fleece vest. That made me a little chilly. Overall, I was pretty good though.
The first mile was a nice and easy loop around my neighborhood. After that, I crossed the street. I decided that I would do a shorter loop than usual. I didn't want to run the big loop. At one point, I opted to change it up. There is a way to cut through to the big loop from the smaller loop.
I don't normally go this way. It's a bit of a challenge with quite the uphill. I made it through by going slowly. As I was on the big loop, I was close to 2.5 miles. I knew I had 2 more miles to go if I did the normal loop.
I added on a little more. There's a loop that is over a mile. I cut it a little shorter and it was probably somewhere between an additional 1/2 mile or more.
Most of the miles were around 8 minutes flat. I was trying to save my legs, so I was going easy. The body felt pretty good. I got back to the school with around a mile to go. I ran a loop around my neighborhood to finish up a solid run.
I thought about going into Nazareth for a run after dark. Even though I finished the first run a little before 1 PM, I felt good and was recovered by 4:30 in the afternoon. I figured, why not try to run while I still had daylight. To do that, I needed another neighborhood run.
The sun was close to setting, so it was a bit more chilly. I wore a heavier top, but everything else was the same. It wasn't bad. We had snow overnight and the roads were slightly more clear during this run. They never were bad though.
Again, I began with a loop around my neighborhood. I crossed the street and started on the shorter loop for a second time. This time, I did the loop and added another section of neighborhood that I don't use much. This has a steep hill.
I put on KT Tape before the run because the quad seemed like it was tweaked a little earlier. It felt pretty good throughout this run. The bottom of my left foot was somewhat sore from the beginning until the end of the run. I'll have to be careful with that.
When I got back to the school, I was at mile 4. I needed 2 more easy miles to finish. I ran around the playground behind the school and then in front of it. There were cops at the school and Channel 69 News. I guess they must've been having a township meeting.
I got back to my neighborhood and did a short loop around there. I then added a smaller loop. I finished up for 6 more miles. This pace was slightly slower than earlier, but only by a few seconds for each mile. It was a good way to finish the day. My legs are slightly sore, but breaking the runs up definitely helped save them.
Tomorrow, the plan is the last big long run before the marathon. If I'm feeling good, I'm hoping for 23 miles. I'm also hoping that Emily can meet up with me for part of it. That would be a huge help. I was planning on taking Wednesday off, but we have a lot of snow coming on Thursday, so I might take that day off and run Wednesday instead. I need a lot of miles this week, but also it is important to recover adequately.
First Run 6 miles - 48:24 (8:04 pace)
Second Run 6 miles - 49:01 (8:10 pace)
No comments:
Post a Comment