Well I survived my hardest week yet, culminating with an eleven mile run, the longest since Portland. With all of my runs I finished strong and comfortably. The heaviness in my legs that I’ve been feeling towards the end my runs is fading at last, and just being able to run 10+ miles in a single go again is a great feeling.
In my experience, I have found that ramping up to higher mileage is much more difficult than maintaining that mileage once it is reached. Getting to 20 miles a week from 10 miles a week is harder than maintaining the higher mileage. I’m now pushing 30 miles a week, which is more than double what I was doing when not training for any particular race. At the peak of my training schedule, I will be doing 43 miles a week. I’ve begun to notice the effects of this ramping, both positive and negative.
The positive is obviously the huge improvements in my running. The negatives are starting to creep up though. I was very sore after my long run, to the point that it affected my sleep. A sore, tired and thoroughly pissed-off Ryan was the result the following morning, which my poor girlfriend had to bear witness to. I am very paranoid about injury, due to my history of running-related injuries, and ramping up mileage greatly increases risk of injury. It leads to minor bouts of panic when I feel a twinge or a pull, thinking that it’s a big injury, rather than just minor pains that all runners have. Longer runs mean sorer legs, which makes it that much harder to get out of the door for the next run.
These negative barriers start to creep up more and more as the marathon training advances. It got the best of me a couple of times while training for Portland, so my experience in dealing with it once should make it easier this time around. This is not meant to be a negative post though. In the end, training for a marathon is fun! It feels like an adventure, a chance to see how far I can push myself. Seeing 11.01 miles on my GPS is an immensely satisfying feeling. I’ve got 14 weeks left until marathon #2, and I’m already starting to look at where I should run #3. This is becoming an addiction…
Tues 6/2/09 – 2.91 mi in 26:01 at 8:57 / mi
Wed 6/3/09 – 6.00 mi in 55:49 at 9:18 / mi
Thurs 6/4/09 – 3.05 mi in 26:55 at 8:50 / mi
Sat 6/6/09 – 6.35 mi in 57:22 at 9:02 / mi
Sun 6/7/09 – 11.01 mi in 1:47:45 at 9:47 / mi
29.32 miles total!
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