OK, this WAS a failed run. :) I had my doubts about how this was going to go walking down to the locker room. I realized as a staggered to work from the bust stop that I didn't roll myself out almost the entire weekend, and I know I didn't after the long run, or even later in the day when I had time.
We had a good turnout from the club for the run, and I was really looking forward to it. I made it a block, and finally turned to B2 who I was running next to and chatting with and told him it wasn't happening, I limped back to work, trying to run across intersection on the chance my my leg would miraculously heal itself. :) It was painful, but crippling till I tried to walk down the slope into our parking garage. I hope there were no children around, because the cursing was a little excessive.
I'll go home and roll it out, maybe try to get it elevated, take more Vitamin I and see how it looks tomorrow. Or maybe just bag it till Wednesday. I hope I can get things together for the weekend.
New shorts seemed pretty comfortable for the brief time I was running in them. Felt a little exposed, but no apparent problems found in two blocks. :)
I'd really like to get one more long run in before the taper starts next week. Worst case I end up with a four week taper. I'm more worried about performance than I am about finishing at this point. Which I fully admit may be cocky and tempting the Marathon Gods. :)
I've done 18.9, 20.5, 22.2, and 21.5 in the last 6 weeks. I'm thinking this is more than adequate prep for a first marathon, especially assuming the theoretical no real goal than finishing. I've gotten slower ( 9:37/mi, 9:25/mi, 9:52/mi, and 10:25/mi) which does concern me, but I think that may be more related to the fact that I've changed my long run route to make it more challenging, and then the 'wonderful' run that the 21.5 turned out to be. The problem is that I've got this unofficial, possibly unreasonable goal of breaking 4 hours for my first marathon, and it's been rolling around in my head long enough to become semi official.
As I was typing this I talked with B about it and I think I'm just going to call it and make this a 4 week taper instead of a 3. Making it to the start line healthy is more important. And hey it's my first marathon...if I misjudge my capabilities and can't do sub 4, then I can just run another one. :)
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2 comments:
The 4-week taper sounds like a safer plan. You really won't lose any training benefits as long as you are running something - even if its brief. You'll gain way more by not starting injured :) Probably the hardest part will be scaling back your diet to make up for the decreased training volume. Good luck!
You've done some pretty long runs there. I think you're set!
I, on the other hand, keep missing long runs because of injuries. Stay healthy!
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