My last long run of the marathon training cycle was a couple weekends ago now. This was the run I was waiting on before I made a decision on signing up for a race. I wanted to feel good after hitting a 20 mile run and then I would feel good about signing up for a marathon with 3 weeks to taper. I made it about 8 miles in before I realized my body was not - and is not - ready for a marathon. My legs were cooked. The problems on this run were largely to do with the fact that

(I think those week numbers are right.) The most consistently difficult thing about marathon training, that I've found, is the time that it takes. Even having dropped back to only running four days a week, I'm logging somewhere on the order of 7-8 hours weekly. That's not even taking into account warming up, cooling off, the extra time it takes to get out of bed the day after running 18 miles, meal planning, meal prepping, and the list goes on. Any kind of exercise is a com

My homemade hydration mix got its first intense field test this past weekend due to me forgetting that I was out of Gatorade powder and not wanting to buy it anywhere but Costco (it's a much better deal, ok?). Fortunately, my prep paid off: my 17 mile run went great and I felt like my concoction kept my hydration at a good level. I stopped for a top off at a water fountain that is beautifully located about halfway down my long-run-route, but hell, in this humidity I probabl

Staying hydrated is an ongoing struggle. Particularly, as I noted in my last post, since I sweat a lot even when running isn't part of the equation. Add in running, the heat and humidity of a summer in the southeastern US, and the miles that I'm logging and my hydration situation can actually be a health concern if I'm not careful. I noticed after my long run this past weekend that I had salt build up on my upper arms - it was probably other places as well, but my brain was

This past Friday was the first day in months that I went out for a run and the weather felt legitimately cool. Cool, in this context, is certainly relative. Stacked up against running in 80+ degree weather with humidity about 95%, my definition of cool weather is biased. Regardless, those 4 miles felt wonderful. There's an incredible difference between feeling close to death by the end of a run and feeling refreshed and even if I'm only marginally less sweaty in the latter

It's alarming how derailing it can be when something gets in your head. When the weather started warming up, I didn't have any targeted running goals, my schedule was a bit off, and I straight up was not ready for the effect that heat can have on running. I peaked with a 14 mile run that felt great back in March or April and then had a decent 15 mile run the next week, but since then it's felt like a steady decline in my ability and/or confidence to get both the distances an

Maybe you're somehow not aware, but it's miserably, oppressively hot outside. This isn't my steering wheel is a little too warm in the afternoon kind of hot either. It's literally 80 degrees with 75% humidity at 5:30am kind of hot. On Monday, I was making up a 6 miler that I had neglected over the weekend and I figured I would get an early start so I was getting cranked up around 7:30am. That turned out to be one of the most miserable 6 miles of my life. Scarcely more than

As much as I get on a soapbox about listening to your body, I'm still pretty terrible at it. This post was originally about how I had started running at night since the weather had begun changing and how that was so much better than running in the middle of the day. I was so confident that now I could look back at my running data and my blog posts over the past year to gauge how I should switch up my running with the seasons. Which, sure, running when it's 95 degrees and hum

As logical as the situation may seem, it took me literally months to come to the conclusion that trying to run my first marathon in June or July was not a great idea. Despite the fact that there are - rightfully - not many marathons in those months, I was still trying to make it happen until I eventually came to the conclusion that my high sweat rate and proclivity for running in the middle of the day do not mix well with 14+ mile training runs this time of year. After many

About half way through training for my first marathon, I've stalled. Only the first attempt, though. After clicking along well for 7 weeks, I had three weeks of my training going progressively off the rails. I muddled through the 15 miler in week 8 despite torrential rain about halfway through and generally not feeling great through the run. The next week was supposed to be lighter, tapering down with a couple days of rest before having a simulated half marathon race. I w