City of Oaks, Week 4 Training

This week was a bit so-so.

Tuesday's workout was 10x400's. Sounds great on paper. Not so great in reality. I did my typical warm up, then on to the laps. The times were 1:59, 1:45, 1:42, 1:46, 1:43, 1:43, 1:40, 1:41, 1:40, and 1:43. Keeping up this pace was very tough. The overall workout was 6.62 miles in 1:17:12, which is an 11:40 pace.

Thursday's workout was a short one in preparation for the long Sunday run. I had 5 on my plan, but I decided to go short, because I'm going to add a bit on my long run on Sunday. I ended up doing 4.21 miles in 44:02, which is a 10:28 pace.

Sunday's run had 20 miles on my plan. This was my last 20+ miler before the marathon, so I was really hoping for a good run. I decided to do the 2x10.5 mile run that is part of the course, which makes it a 21 mile run. I started at the usual place on Duraleigh and made the turn onto Ebenezer. I could tell right away, it was going to be a hard run. I was really feeling the first hill on Ebenezer, which is not usually that hard. I fought my way up and into Umstead. Overall the first half of the run was good. I ran it at an 11:02 pace, but I was definitely feeling tired. I had a 3 minute transition to swap bottles and grab food, which factors into my overall time. The second half was a real struggle. The Ebenezer hills were pretty tough, and I had to take my first break to stretch a bit. Even coming down the Graylin hill was beating up on my quads. I had to take numerous breaks to stretch and walk throughout. I ended the second half at an 11:49 pace. The overall run was 20.94 miles at 4:01:59, which is an 11:33 pace. Very tough run.

3 weeks to go...