Training for Grandma’s Marathon is half over already. It’s starting to feel like the race is like a freight train coming at me!
Training is going well overall, but I don’t know if I’m ever going to feel ready for this race. Even when I have an amazing run and hit mile splits I didn’t think I could hit, I still feel afraid I won’t be able to keep the pace I want for the race.
Two weeks ago, it felt like I couldn’t buy a sub-8:00 mile no matter how much I gave. Even the half marathon I ran that weekend was rough. But last week, I was busting out 7:30s on seven and nine mile runs like they were nothing. My 18-mile long run this past weekend was 7 seconds/mile under marathon PR pace. It’s just been a lot of ups and downs, it seems. It’s hard to get a good feel of where I’m at.
To be fair, I’m still only halfway through training and there are eight weeks to go until the race. That’s a lot of time to make improvements and I’ve done a lot over the last two months. I’ve absolutely been converted to a daily foam roller. It’s amazing the difference in how my legs feel in the morning when I foam roll the night before versus when I don’t.
The thing that’s keeping me completely sane is that I haven’t set a hard goal yet. I’m training as if I’m going for a 3:30 finish, but I’m still 50⁄50 between really going for it versus targeting 3:40 and making this race a step-off point for a fall BQ attempt. Literally just now as I was typing this, I got the email that I was selected for the Chicago Marathon this year so that’s a big consideration and gives me an idea of what my fall will look like. Plus, I’m also going to sign up for the Walt Disney World Dopey Challenge (5k + 10k + half marathon + marathon over four days) at noon today! Obviously, that won’t be any sort of a race for time, but it’s something to think about when I plan out my fall race schedule.
