6.14 mi, 53:09, 8:40 avg
Overall, not a bad run. I spent a little extra time warming up - lunges, jumping jacks, high knees, leg swings. It seemed to help a little bit. Instead of a 10:30-11:00 mile, first mile was 9:48, then 9:00, and then the rest in the 8:nn's and I felt much better at the end than I did at the beginning. For some of the run I didn't feel like running and almost took a walk break a few times, but resisted and knew I'd feel better if I kept on going.
Last year, I ran a marathon in the spring for fun to pace a friend (Jamie at the Buffalo marathon), and two weeks later I ran the Utah Valley marathon to hopefully BQ but I missed the minimum BQ time by 7 minutes for a 3:37. So, I trained some more, especially for downhill and ran the Super Tunnel Marathon in Washington state where I did better, but did not better my BQ time (1:42 cushion at Marine Corps Marathon in Fall 2015).
Then in October, I ran the Oil Creek 100 mile race in PA so I could enter the lottery for Western States 100. It was touch and go and if not for my crew (Jim and Cynthia) would not have made it. Two weeeks later I was feeling pretty good when I ran Marine Corps Marathon "for fun" and ran 3:27:00, good for a 3:00 Boston cushion, better than any cut off so far. But, that would not be good enough, but it was good for not doing any real marathon training - I was running a lot of 5K's and improving my time and running some volume of slow heart rate miles for general fitness and 100 mile race training. I also improved my half marathon time to almost break 1:30 again (which was good enough for NYC marathon entry).
So, no Boston for 2018. It would have been nice but honestly, I never brought the right amount of focus to marathon training, but that's ok. I do feel bad for the people who did have full focus and a good plan but could "only" get 3:22 or less above and beyond Boston cut off time. The bottom line I guess is that it is different for everyone, you get out what you put in but that might still not be enough. But, while playing the BQ game I am staying in shape, giving me my health and sanity and I am within striking distance and believe that some good will come out of it.
PM - 2.16 mi, 18:04, 8:21 avg
Took Stella to Longleaf for "Hump Day Hustle" run. We just did an out and back on the bike trail. 9:24 pace on the way up and 7:30 pace on the way back. She seemed to like the way back a lot better. She got lots of pets at the end from her admirers. When I got back to my car I saw that Cynthia texted me, said she saw me running with Stella and that she'd be at Lonzalos with Harry. So, I got Stella back out of the car and we went to say hi (she also had her two dogs Bones and Tasha with her). Stella liked this part also.
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