Chicks Dig the Long Run

A quick perusal of my always exciting running log tells me that I haven’t run double digit miles in over two months. That’s appalling, especially when you take into consideration that I have the Georgetown to Idaho Springs Half Marathon approaching quickly. I’m feeling the need to get longer, which is actually very easy according to the forty e-mails a week that I find in my spam folder. Anyway, I’ll be putting in some long runs over the next few weekends and hoping that the last minute cramming technique will serve me as well in my running as it did in my skooling. Hoo boy, I’m screwed!

I may even throw in some double digit runs in the middle of the week which is unheard of for me. I was giving serious thought to putting in a 10 miler this morning but I forgot was too lazy to get up early enough to squeeze it in before work and the forecast calls for temperatures in the low 100s today. My run tonight will depend greatly on the temperature when I get home from work, but I’m hoping to gut out an 8 miler at the very least.

My fear is that I have been too focused on getting faster and have forgotten that I need to maintain a healthy long run. By way of example, my last run was only 4 miles but it did include some 4 x 800s. Hey, everyone else is doing them, I thought I should too.

Interval 1: 3:39 (7:18 pace)
Interval 2: 3:46 (7:32 pace)
Interval 3: 3:41 (7:22 pace)
Interval 4: 3:45 (7:30 pace)

At this rate I will have no problem maintaining my goal pace for my upcoming half marathon... right up until I hit 7 miles, at which point I expect the lungnuts will come loose and the wheels will fall off the wagon. The only saving grace here is that the second half of this course is downhill (as is the first half) which means that I might just be able to tumble all the way to the finish. Let’s call that Plan B. Plan A will be for me to get in some more double digit runs over the next 3 weeks so as to stave off the biggest fade since Kid ‘N Play took the mic.