Boston bound

I realize that I have not entered any blogs of recent. The post marathon relaxing got to me and then the holidays took over. Now, being cold January, and I mean COLD, here I am.

Barry and I joined a gym in December. I thought I'd be able to run outdoors most of the winter but quickly found that it's more difficult than you would think. It's one thing to just go out for a run and not have a goal. But I really don't like two stepping along in the icey and I especially don't like slipping on ice. So since early December, most of my miles have been indoors.

The treadmill is better than I thought. At first it felt like time stood still. One mile seemed to take 15 minutes. But now, since I've been on it for over a month, I'm used to it and time has normalized. Updating my playlist weekly helps, and This American Life helps on my long runs. Mixing it up bit helps on those mentally challenging days. Our gym has an indoor track where 1 mile equals eleven-and-a-half times around. I do 2 miles at once - 23 laps is about all my brain can handle. One day I ran 6 miles on the track and it wasn't until one of my clients (who also goes to that gym) asked me how many times around that was. 69.

This week I'm running my biggest week since starting my 18 week program. 46 miles, including a 17 miler today. (I plan to do 11 on the treadmill and then 6 on the track) I've never done this 18 week plan but figure Boston deserves some special attention. I actually might get there well prepared despite running so much indoors since the treadmill helps me to keep easy runs easy, long runs at long run pace and tempo runs at tempo pace. Outdoors I end to fall into one pace - 8 minute miles no matter what. That makes me pretty fit but mostly tired by marathon day.

But anyway, time to pack my gym bag and my gu. More soon.