Since getting started in late November of last year, I have now logged 230 miles. Before this, I had only run occasionally (ok more like rarely) on my treadmill. I had not done any road running. As I’ve said before, I’ve been very surprised at how different road running is from treadmill running. And while I can’t say that I really enjoy running, it’s not nearly as bad as I thought that it would be! I can definitely say that investing all of this time and putting in all of these miles is paying-off. I have much greater endurance than I had before. Regardless of the question of pace or time to complete the marathon, at least I can now say that I’m starting to have the confidence that I can complete the marathon.
Now let me tell you about today’s 15 miles. I think that it went great!! The photo above is of Storm Cat, the star stallion at Overbrook Farm. Our course today circled Overbrook Farm from my house, and gave us some nice scenery to pass the time. I want to thank my teammates for agreeing to this route. At our weekly running meeting at the office, I gave my pitch for this run and got a fair amount of scrutiny in the process. I didn’t take any of that personally though. I realize that you can’t be a good engineer if you trust an architect!! Ultimately, I was very happy that this run had everything that I was hoping for. It was a good blend of gradual hills with some steeper hills and some relatively flat running for recovery. It was also a nice blend of countryside running with some suburban running and a park thrown in for good measure. Best of all, I’ve been told that it is a good approximation of what the marathon course will be. For me, this was a huge confidence booster. With 230 miles under my belt, and facing hundreds more ahead in this training, I see that we can use these long runs to build our confidence, and come close to even enjoying it.
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