Today marks one month until I stand at the start line of another marathon. To say I have mixed feelings about this is an absolute understatement. August and September had some major ups in my training and running accomplishments, and also some major downs. Just like hills are an important part of a training plan, they are just as important in life to keep you focused.
Total August Miles: 97.13 miles
Total September Miles: 113.77 miles
This is the first year that I have hit 100 miles in a month this many times, and although I didn’t hit that mark in July or August I came pretty dang close. I think it is pretty safe to say that I will be racking up more miles this year than I did last year, and I think I’ll probably hit 1200 miles, but I’m not going to count those chickens before they hatch.
- January 2018: 66.50 miles / January 2019: 100.03 miles
- February 2018: 74.53 miles / February 2019: 100.12 miles
- March 2018: 89.00 miles / March 2019: 116.26 miles
- April 2018: 70.75 miles / April 2019: 104.41 miles
- May 2018: 100.19 miles / May 2019: 111.69 miles
- June 2018: 78.57 miles / June 2019: 100.07 miles
- July 2018: 79.76 miles / July 2019: 93.25 miles
- August 2018: 136.95 miles / August 2019: 97.13 miles
- September 2018: 137.30 miles / September 2019: 113.77 miles
- October 2018: 80.11 miles /
- November 2018: 63.0 miles /
- December 2018: 103.33 miles /
- TOTAL 2018: 1080 miles / TOTAL 2019: 937 miles
What was I training for? I officially started marathon training at the end of July/beginning of August. I had some other races I planned on doing but I thought of them as part of the marathon training, not necessarily races I was training for individually.
What races did I run? Rise & Shine 5k with My Team Triumph, Lake Lansing Marathon Relay, Crim, Run For Your Heart Half Marathon, Capital City Half Marathon Relay
Best performances: Crim was absolutely amazing. I was in great shape coming off my 5k training and getting ramped up for marathon training. I had gotten new shoes and the weather was the best we’ve had for Crim in all of the years that I have run it. My endurance has been my focus in 2019 and it absolutely paid off at Crim. I ran the whole race without walking (except a few brief pauses at “water stations” – aka Champagne Corner and the bacon and mimosas at mile 7-ish) and maintained my pace around 11 minutes per mile.
Opportunities for improvement: While August brought some awesome accomplishments and I was feeling really great about everything, I got completely burned out after that. In September I started to struggle with following my plan and honestly with running period. I had a couple of runs that I was crying by the end of because I just wanted them to be over, and I wanted to stop hating running. There are a lot of factors involved in why I began to feel the way that I was feeling, and it culminated in me wondering if I was injured and deciding to drop out of Ragnar. The last week of September was a very rough one for me, but I realized I needed to focus on myself, make some changes, and take care of every part of me – mind, body and spirit.
What’s ahead: As I said at the beginning of this post, my marathon is one month from today. I have mixed feelings about it because I had been doing so great and feeling amazing about my running, then basically “hit the wall” in September. I’ve gotten my poop in a group and re-focused my training since then. The injury I was concerned about seems to be okay now, but I am being very careful and training smart to avoid hurting myself again. I found shoes that work better for me and I think will work with me to run a great marathon next month. My work schedule has also changed, and even though I have only been on the new schedule for two days, I have already noticed improvements in my sleep and what I am getting done in a day.
I’m nervous because it is a marathon, and marathons should be taken seriously. I ran 18 miles this past weekend and although they went really, really well, I was literally torn up from it (chafing the dream, they say). It is a new marathon, one I have never done before. And I can’t help but worry about whether or not my injury will flare up. You never know what will happen on race day and it sucks because ALL of this just comes down to one day.
On the other hand, I am excited, because my training has gone really well minus a few blips here and there. I am going to Indy with friends who are super supportive and awesome, and will hopefully get to run at least the first 7 miles with a couple of them. Those two friends are pretty much doing this race (the half marathon) to support me and I cannot thank them enough. I will get to meet another online friend of mine – so far this year I have already met two long time online friends, and both were absolutely the most incredible experiences. (I’ll write a blog about that in the future…) So there is a lot to look forward to, I just have to trust in my training and have faith in myself that I can absolutely do this.
I am Marathon Megan, after all. :)
RD on the Run 