Wycombe & 28-miler

The Wycombe Half Marathon was last Sunday. It went fine. I was aiming for a sub 1:30 and got a 1:29:09. This was 5:37 faster than my time in the same race a year ago, so a substantial improvement. I wasn't taking this race all that seriously - only a half marathon, after all - so I was relaxed and went at a comfortable pace from start to finish.

My son enjoyed the 1.5 mile fun run and we were proud of him for finishing it and receiving the medal at the end. A great start to his running career.

I finished the training week yesterday with a 28 miler, from Uxbridge to Windsor Great Park and back again.  That's the furthest I've ever run. My pace was not extraordinary (7:38) but distance was the main goal. I find the challenge of these very long runs to be more psychological than physical. I'm OK with not drinking any fluids during these runs, even when it's relatively warm out (I think yesterday it got to about 75 F / 24 C), and I don't feel sore today. But I can't say I found the latter miles of yesterday's run to be exactly pleasant. Still, I love the feeling of accomplishment that I have after a really long run, and I hope that as my body gets more accustomed to running these distances, I'll be able to enjoy these runs more. I'm aiming for about 30 miles every other Saturday.

July update

I didn't run for a week after the Edinburgh Marathon. I'd had a lingering, slight pain in my left foot for weeks, and I wanted to see if I could finally get rid of it by staying off it. It didn't work, the slight pain is still there today, it never gets better or worse. I only feel it when I flex my foot. I'm hoping it will eventually just disappear.

Since this brief hiatus, my training has been focused on building a steady mileage base for my next marathon (Abingdon, 17 October 2010). I've been on the road a lot so much of this training has occurred in the USA (visiting family in Chapel Hill, NC and Fredericksburg, VA) and Scotland (I returned to Edinburgh for a conference -- had great runs on Calton Hill and up to the Salisbury Crags). I've been averaging 41 miles per week over the past five weeks and yesterday my long run was 24 miles. I've been feeling a little sluggish, which is one reason to take it easier over the next couple weeks -- the other reason is I'm running the Wycombe Half Marathon on 18 July (two weeks from today) so I want to taper a little bit. I ran this race last year (in 1:34:46) and enjoyed it. As it's not a full marathon I'm not taking it super-seriously, I see it as halfway between race and training run. A big incentive to do it is that they also have a 1.5 mile fun run that my four-year-old son can participate in. It'll be his first race, he's excited about it, and he'll be thrilled to get the medal at the end if he finishes (1.5 miles seems a little long for him but I think he can do it).

My long run yesterday was along the Grand Union Canal, the Victorian waterway that goes from London to Birmingham and passes through Uxbridge, very close to my home. Actually all of my runs last week were along this canal. It's a beautiful place to run, green and peaceful, generally well-maintained trails and no roads to cross. I'm so thankful for this canal -- if it weren't there, my Uxbridge runs would involve much more asphalt and traffic-dodging.

I'm excited that my 'Good-for-age' entry form for the 2011 London Marathon arrived yesterday, so it looks like I'm really in. I'll post it on Monday.