Finally Feels Like Marathon Training

I think yesterday was about as fun as running 11 miles could be. We went to a new place and it was great. We loved it because it was a bike path and completely flat. The only problem we had is there's no water fountains along the path so if we wanted drinks, we had to bring them. Normally, when we do our long runs I will drive out ahead of time and drop gatorade around the halfway point.

Well, fortunately between Alyson & I we have 6 kids. Okay, well 2 of them are too small to help us at all, but there are 4 older ones that are more than capable :) We ended up bringing one of Alyson's kids along (with his bike). He had a backpack to hold our Gatorade and Beans. I think he felt like he was doing us a real service...and he WAS! It's nice to have someone at your beck and call when you need something. I could get used to that!

Anyway, we did the Galloway method. 4 minutes running and 1 minute walking. It's a beautiful thing. It works. I'm a believer.

The 3 of us run at different paces so it can be hard to find a pace that's comfortable for everyone. We have a tendency to start our runs too fast and then struggle later on. I really did not want that to happen yesterday since we were going so far. I wanted to keep a slower than slow pace just so everyone would finish and not feel horrible so I tried to really follow Jeff's guidelines as far as running 2 minutes per mile slower than your regular pace. For me, I'm in the 9:30 or so area so that would mean 11:30-12:00 miles. The others are probably in the 11:00 range so they should've been going around 13 minutes miles. I don't know how it's possible to run THAT slow. 13 minute miles might even be too slow for them! Actually, I did run that slow with someone once and it was absolute torture. I think we did 14 minute miles on a 10 mile run..I felt like I was dying a slow, painful death.

Anyway, we averaged 12 minute miles and that's including the walk breaks. We stuck to the 4-1 intervals the whole time. I have to say that I felt really good at the end. There were a few times that I would look at my watch and realize that we were going "too fast" and I'd have to put the breaks on. I just hope the other girls felt as good at the end. They said they did. I'll have to get an update and see how they felt the rest of the day.

As far as injuries/mishaps go..my hip has been hurting a bit since our run. That happens every once in awhile. Linda's sock got all bunched up and by the time we finished she had taken it off. Alyson - she seemed to be complaint free...all in all a pretty good run!