Sunday Marathon Training

I just never hit my stride today. I pushed a little bit on the first nine miles and hit that mark 3 minutes late. I figured this was okay since last time I ran it in the opposite direction and lost 5 minutes in that stretch. Of course that was the last 9 miles of 19 rather than the first, so it probably wasn't okay after-all.

Today was supposed to be warm and it was pretty nice while the sun was out, but when the clouds came it became downright chilly. This is what happened when I made my turn at the 9 mile point. I didn't have the energy, or perhaps the will, to pick-up the pace to a level where I would be warm. So the rest of the run was more of an 'endure the unpleasantness of it' than 'push hard and make a good training of it' kind of thing.

At around the 18.5 mile point I even stopped and walked the rest. My time at that point was about 2:42, while the last couple of times I did it in 2:37 for the whole thing.

I will probably do the thing one more time before the Boston marathon and then begin to taper-off after that. It would be nice if the final run had a decent time as this would be a bit of a confidence-booster for me.

The 9-mile point is where I make a Right turn from Lowell Road onto Barretts Mill Road down at the South end of the map.