Mid-Marathon Report Card

My marathon training hit it's midpoint a couple of weeks ago, culminating in my first 20+ mile training run.  I thought it would be a good idea to give myself some grades on parts of my training up to this point.  I had a few goals while using Hal Hidgon's advanced-I training guide:

• Weigh 175 pounds on marathon morning

Grade:  A.  I started this training (roughly) in mid-December.  I weighed 189.2 on December 14th.  As of March 8th, I weigh 179.2.  10 lb loss without changing much of my diet.  I believe in order to make my weight, I will need to change up my diet just a tad.  The alcohol consumption will be taken out completely after this Saturday.

• Do not skip any workouts

Grade:  B+.  It is tough to define what I skipped as there are some days that you may have 3 miles scheduled, but you need the day off.  Your legs and head both tell you that the muscles need some repair time.  I believe I only skipped out on Amy once and, if I recall, it was because I had IT-band issues.  The weather has been cold thus far in the training, but that has not deterred me.  I could improve with incorporating some weight-training.

• Incorporate Speed/Hill workouts

Grade: B.  Hal's guide calls for speed/hill work once a week.  I've done pretty well with the speed work as I'm up to 7 yasso's on the track, however the scheduled hill work hasn't been completely adopted.  I run at Percy Warner Park that has incredible hills, but I don't measure off a quarter mile of hill and sprint up and down a half dozen times.  I just run the 11.2 and do the hills that way.  Eh.  I need to work on pace runs and some tempo runs.  

• Diet

Grade:  D.  My diet has barely changed.  My portions decreased a bit, and I'm going out to eat less, but I'm still eating things I shouldn't.  I don't eat fast food anymore but I started drinking 2% instead of skim (I'll thank my mom for that).  I have stepped up the carb loading for long runs and races, but it hurts that I can't eat meat on Fridays and runs are on the weekends.  I like some protein with my carbs.  I hope to improve this the most.  

• Enjoyment

Grade: A+.  It's nice to have a running partner and it's fun to run in groups for the long runs.  My first go around with this marathon business I had neither.  It's great this time around.  I'm looking forward to races and long runs, and even don't mind getting up at 5 for them OR skipping my Friday night debauchery.  

So there you have it.  I need to improve some aspects, but as I told Amy after our run last weekend, I'm very happy with my training.  My normal, without-thinking pace I run while I'm alone is roughly 8:40, which is a vast improvement over last year.  My heart-rate is down to about 143 while doing those miles.  I feel good. 

Booya