Marathon Training: week 4

Well, I'm a little late here, but I think it's time for some weekly training recaps for my upcoming marathon. My team, the Power Milers, are running the Rocket City Marathon in early December, and training is underway. The first month was mostly base building, but we have increased our long run to 16 miles, so by now I think we can safely consider this actual training. I'm pretty excited, because our group coach assigns marathon goal paces for us to base our workouts off, and he gave me 6:52! That's so incredibly fast to me! But maybe I can pull of a 3:01 or under - I'd be thrilled. Step one is get to the starting line in one piece. Step two is excel at the workouts. If either of those seems in jeopardy, of course, I will modify that goal pace.

So this week was a little weird, because I was taking it easy for three reasons: one, I bonked hard at MILE FIVE, I repeat FIVE, of the long run last week, and therefore took the following week easy. And two, because I developed terrible plantar fasciitis. And lastly because we were traveling!

Monday: off to recover from failed run the day before.
Tuesday: I didn't do our group workout, opting for five easy instead. Still in bonk-recovery.
Wednesday: 6.5 easy.
Thursday: We had a cold-front with morning temperatures of just 79 F! I ran a totally enjoyable 9.5 on the levee.
Friday: I was supposed to skip this workout, too, but I forgot that I was on a recovery week and ran a little over ten miles. The workout was 4-5 miles at tempo effort with one minute jogs. I ran five at 6:39, 6:29, 6:35, 6:30, 6:36. Felt great, so I guess whatever had me down last week had faded away!
Saturday: I was on an overnight boat cruise, so no running for me. I could have run when we got home in the afternoon, but - I didn't.
Sunday: Long run. 16.2 miles at 7:36 pace, which went well despite very humid temperatures. I made sure I drank a ton of water and took some salt tabs this time, and although my plantar fasciitis bothered me later, I didn't feel it too much during the run.

Total miles: 48, not bad for a "down" week!