MarathonFest

OK I've been a slacker with the blog. But, I wrote three more entries about my Japan trip and am resolved to finish up the rest by next week. I've been busy with the usual... and a heavy dose of running.

I returned from the trip determined to pick up and emphasize my running. It was so exciting to travel there and also meet a bunch of other people sharing an interest. Plus, I would like to do a marathon later in the year, and finish in a decent time, so I signed up for Marathonfest, a local training program. The program includes Tuesday track workouts, Thursday tempo runs, and Saturday morning runs.

I'll attend as many Tuesday track sessions as I can, but probably skip the Thursday tempo run in favor of staying local in Lake Mary and running with the Y group. The Saturday morning long run is the cornerstone of the program, and something I haven't been doing on my own. Or done for quite a while.

What is tough is how early that long run is - meet at 5:45 AM (or earlier!) and leave at 6:00 AM. Harsh but necessary.

So it was tough getting up at 4:45 AM for the first long run I could make. I was still groggy pulling into the park, but was happy to see about 40-50 other people also up at this crazy hour. Others tell me this spring session is half the size of the fall session! The group has critical mass, whereby you could search around a bit and find other people wanting to run your pace and desired distance. Or you could just run the day's workout with your own pace group. I wound up running with 3 or 4 others, an out-and-back in Winter Park for 7.9 miles in 1:06, for an 8:25 pace.

The next workout was short for me - I signed up for a 5K, so I just ran a warmup of 3.9 miles, out-and-back to the first water stop. Following this I did the House of Hope 5K in about 22:40, which I am very happy with since I haven't been doing much speed work.