The temps dropped last night and it was 20 when I headed out the door. Planned on running the first 8 miles at a very easy pace (around 8:30/mile) then run the next 12 at marathon pace (7:15/mile) then run the last 2 miles easy. Felt very comfortable and ended up averaging a little faster than 8:00/mile for the first 8. Stopped to figure out why I was getting a shot of pain in my heal every time I jumped off a curb. After inspecting my shoe, I realized that I had a giant tack stuck in the bottom of my shoe. I have no idea how I didn't notice this before. Started the MP run and the first couple miles felt very easy at 7:00/mile. Consciously backed off the pace because I didn't want to crash. The first few miles are downhill to flat then there are a series of uphills. I figured that this course mimics Boston very well and would be a good test. Hit the uphill section and the pace only dropped to 7:10-7:15/mile. I expected a much bigger drop. The big hilly mile was 7:30 and my HR jumped to 165 but that was expected. A couple more small climbs then some downhill then finished with 3 flat miles. All came in between 7:05-7:15/mile. I felt very good about the effort. Overall pace for the MP miles was 7:11/mile which I was excited about considering how much climbing that I had to do. I have always struggled with longer MP runs so it was really nice to have a good one.
I should have mapped out this run before I went out. I thought that I
knew how far it was and thought that I would have to add on a couple of
miles at the end. The planned 22 miler ended up being 24.5. Knowing that I still had 4 miles until I got home instead of 2, I called home letting Amy know that I would be late. She offered to pick me up but I figured that the extra 2 miles would be good for me. Ran the last 4 at 8:00/mile and finished the last 0.5 at MP. Considered running 1.7 miles more just to make it a full marathon (would have been around 3:16-3:17 and not an all out effort) but decided that I had enough.
Total Time: 3:05:10 (7:33/mile)
Avg HR: 150 | 