Recovering nicely from the big run on Saturday. Monday I was still a little limpy due to the massive blister between my big toes, but by yesterday that was looking and feeling a lot better. Yesterday I did a lot of walking around campus, and this morning I went out for a walk. I actually felt so good on the walk this morning that it was tempting to run instead! But I wanted to give my knee one more low-impact day. I'll do a gentle run tomorrow.

I did it! Twenty miles yesterday morning. For the most part, it was an excellent run. We ran along the riverbed from Oracle west to La Cholla and back, and then east to Craycroft and back.

I ran by myself for the first 8 miles or so -- there were other TNTers up ahead and not too far behind, but I wasn't running alongside anyone. The first 45 minutes or so were mentally challenging because it was quite dark and I wasn't very familiar with that part of the riverbed path. So in a way, it was nice to be by myself because there was nothing to distract my attention from trying not to trip! Once it began to get light, the little bunnies started to come out, and there were a couple miles of extremely cute bunnies everywhere. It turned into a gorgeous, cool morning.

I was keeping a good, steady pace, and everything felt just about right. I was trying to run mindfully, just noticing each step as it occurred, instead of letting my mind wander off into worries and fantasies. It's amazing how much less boring running is when I focus my attention on it instead of distracting myself from it. I feel like I really experienced this run, rather than just "getting through it."

Around Mile 8, Coach Ashley found me and ran with me for about 3 miles, and she caught up with me again around Mile 13. By Mile 13, I was starting to get tired, but felt like I could keep my slow steady pace up for a long time. I mentioned that to Ashley, and I must have jinxed myself by doing so, because shortly thereafter my left knee started hurting a lot. It was a sudden pain and it nearly took my breath away because it was so intense. Based on the location of the pain, Ashley thought maybe it was my IT band getting irritated, but she said it was unusual for IT band pain to happen so suddenly. We stopped and stretched and then walked for about half a mile, and then I decided to see what would happen if I started running again. It still hurt quite a bit and I was afraid that I might have to walk the rest of the way back. But I was able to run through it and after a mile or so, it seemed to loosen up a little bit, enough that I could keep on running even with the pain.

With 2.5 miles to go, I was clearly going to make it in OK, so Ashley turned around to pick up some other runners and I did the last stretch solo. My legs were extremely tired and sore by now. I wasn't really noticing my knee anymore, but that might have been because the pain in the rest of my legs had caught up to the pain in my knee. Even my abs were hurting at this point! However, I wasn't tempted to stop and walk, because I could tell that if I walked, everything would start hurting a lot more. So I just kept it slow (very slow) and steady, even bypassing the last water station because I didn't want to interrupt the tenuous momentum that I seemed to have going. I started mentally labeling my steps in triplets (right-left-right left-right-left right-left-right left-right-left); for some reason, mentally "chunking" the steps made them feel easier.

I finished in 3 hours 57 minutes, which is just about a 12-minute mile pace on average. That would be a totally decent marathon pace for me! When I got within sight of the finish area, I could see that all the TNT run coaches (even including the winter team coaches) were there to cheer me in. They waved signs, applauded, and rang bells as I approached. It felt great! As soon as I stumbled into the gazebo and sat down, one of them started taking off my shoes for me, another one was getting me a cool washcloth, and Louanne prepared a little ice bath for me to stick my feet into. I could get used to being pampered like that. :-) My feet did pretty well on this run. The blister I'd incurred earlier in the week did fine with just a bandaid. I seem to have developed another one between my big toes on the same foot, but I'm hoping it will heal easily too.

I sat around for a half hour or so to cheer the other runners in. There was lots of food and I tried to make myself eat something, although all I could manage was half a peanut butter sandwich. Eventually, I stumbled home, showered, and took my ice bath (an extra cold one with three bags of ice). It was a somewhat rough afternoon after that. I was still in a lot of pain despite the ice bath, and while I wanted to rest or nap, my whole lower body would start aching intensely when I would lie down. I was also still having trouble making myself eat. Eventually, I was able to fall asleep for a couple of hours and felt a lot better after that, especially with the help of some ice packs on my knees and a couple of Advil. I slept for 11 hours last night, and this morning, my joints are definitely sore! I have ice packs on my knees as I type.

So overall, it was an awesome run. I went into it with the right attitude ("this is going to hurt, but that's OK! it just means it's working!") and I saw that I could get through a lengthy run even with some substantial pain. Plus, the majority of the run was pain-free and enjoyable. I'm now officially excited about Race Day!

We are now in the pre-race "taper" period, meaning no hill training, no strength training, and no substantial distance between now and race day. Really, my main jobs in the next 3 weeks are to let my body heal and to not get injured. I am taking these jobs very seriously. Heeled shoes: you only increase the probably that I will twist my ankle, so you're all on sabbatical until after the race! Same for you, lawns that I sometimes walk across on campus: I'll be staying on solid pavement that is free from gopher holes. I also probably won't run at all in the next week, because I want to let my knee heal completely from whatever was ailing it yesterday. What I'll do instead are some gentle walks with a lot of stretching afterward. Coach Ashley thought that maybe the knee problem was due to a lack of stretching in the previous week; I hadn't been stretching much since I was staying off the blister.

Have I mentioned that I am pumped for tomorrow's 20-miler? It's going to hurt like crazy and be super awesome!

My blister is healing and my freezer is full of ice. Bring on the distance!!

Foot update: I emailed Coach Ashley about my blister, and she recommended that I keep it protected and stay off it as much as possible this week, or at least take it easy on any runs I do. Argh, taking it easy is no fun! But I know she's right. It doesn't look too bad this morning, but it could easily become infected.

I might do a really teeny run (just 2 or 3 miles) tomorrow morning to keep my muscles limber and test out a blister bandaging scheme for Saturday's 20-miler.

What did my left foot go and do on our 5-mile run this morning? Develop a blister on its arch. How rude! It's not a terrible one, but I can tell that it will get very sore if exacerbated, so I'm going to need to baby it this week. Silly, silly foot. It's getting to that point in the game where I've developed a healthy paranoia about injuring myself before the race. (And blisters count as injuries -- they can take you out for a long time if they get bad.)

I had a great 12-mile run this morning! I was accompanied by my friend Ashley, a fellow clinical psych student who recently started training with TNT to walk a marathon in January. We chatted about all manner of things and the 12 miles just seemed to fly by. Plus, it was a gorgeous, cool morning. I wish every run could be so easy and fun!

race course!

Exciting stuff: here's the race course for the marathon that I'll be running exactly one month from today!!

The most exciting thing for me about this course? By staying around the periphery of the city, it avoids many of those famous San Francisco hills! :-D

Got back out there and ran 5 miles this morning. It was a good run. I felt solid and strong.

I'm kind of amazed at how tolerant my body is being. I put it through an enormous amount of stress by running 18 miles, and now after just 3 mornings it runs again without any complaints at all. Wow.

I ran 18 miles yesterday!

The route was similar to what we did for the 16-miler a couple of weeks ago, but extended a little bit. So the whole run was along the river path. I felt rested and energetic at the start. I was a little worried because it was already about 80 degrees by the time we started at 5am, but fortunately, it didn't get a whole lot hotter than that during the run. There were some scattered low clouds in the sky, not enough to make it feel like a "cloudy day" but enough to cover the sun and keep things cool (cool for summer in Tucson, at least). Even though we were running due east for Miles 3-11, the sun was never in my eyes. This was especially fortunate because I'd forgotten my visor! Even with coffee, it can be hard to think straight while gathering up one's running gear at 4:15am...

Coach Ashley ran with me for the first 9-ish miles of the run. Around Mile 5 or so, I noticed that my leg muscles were feeling quite fatigued already -- much more so than they normally would be after running 5 miles. I don't know why that was. It was definitely the type of pain I associate with fatigue, not the acute knee or ankle pain that I've occasionally gotten. Maybe my legs didn't appreciate the slightly longer run on Thursday? I wasn't underfueled or underhydrated -- I'd had coffee and a piece of toast before the run, and consumed plenty of Gatorade, salt, Sport Beans, and plain old water during the run. There was nothing to do but keep on going. I could tell it was going to make the later miles tough, though.

Around Mile 9, Ashley turned around to pick up some other runners who were a little ways back on the path, so I was on my own for the "back nine." That was definitely a challenge. The landscape along the river path is barren between Campbell and Craycroft (which is a 3 or 4 mile stretch of this route both on the way there and again on the way back), and especially when you're starting to get tired, it's hard not having anyone to cheer you on or at least distract you. Every now and then I would pass (or be passed by) a TNT mentor or coach, and that would keep me going. They would always make sure I was doing OK. A few times, I even got cheered on by non-TNT people who noticed my TNT jersey, which was really cool! Other than that, I mostly occupied my mind with people-watching, since there were lots of people walking, running, biking, and skating along the path. I was particularly cracked up by this one woman who was pushing a little pink baby buggy containing not a baby but her two teeny identical dogs. Ridiculous!

My legs and feet were pretty unhappy for the last 8 miles or so. I kept feeling unsure about whether I should do walk intervals or not, because while it gave me a little rest, it also hurt a lot to start up running again after a walk. I ended up running consistently during miles 11-15, and then taking several 1-minute walk intervals during the last 3 miles. I never let myself stop and walk indefinitely, though -- I would always choose a landmark up ahead where I would start running again. Those last few miles were really slow, even for the parts where I was running! There were several times when I noticed that I was mumbling audible encouragement to myself as I shuffled along.

I ended up finishing in about three-and-a-half hours. That shows how much slower my pace was on this run -- recall that it took me just under three hours to do 16 miles. It was a huge relief to get back to base camp, sit down, and stretch. Louanne, the marathon coordinator, always brings an ice-cold cooler full of washcloths, and it feels GREAT to mop down with one after a long run. I sat for a few minutes, and then hobbled back to my car to go home. The ice bath actually felt really good this time. I napped for several hours, and couldn't do much of anything the rest of the day except eat. I ended up falling asleep at about 8pm because it was taking way too much energy to even sit up.

Today I feel good. Legs are tired but not sore. I'm going to give them a good rest now so that they'll quit it with the muscle fatigue thing. I can't believe we only have one more long training run (20 miles in a couple of weeks) and then supposedly I will be sufficiently trained to run a marathon. Seriously?!

True to my own prediction, I did not go running during Andrew's visit. We did take a nice little hike up at Mount Lemmon, which included a couple of small-but-steep hills (see? I do too do hill training!) as well as an excellent storm that included pea-sized hail.

Andrew left early Tuesday morning and I really should have gone running yesterday morning, but I couldn't quite activate myself to get out of bed -- I was in a terrible mood and missing Andrew and generally just wishing I could sleep all day. Oh well. Still, I really did want to get in one decent run before the upcoming 16-18 mile monster on Saturday, so this morning I went over to Reid and ran 6 miles and walked another 3. It went fine and I kept a good, consistent pace the whole time.

Unfortunately, I am not getting along so well with the FuelBelt. I've figured out that in order to keep it from moving around and scratching me up, I have to wear it fairly tightly at the smallest part of my waist. This feels OK when I start out and then becomes uncomfortable. Also, I'm finding that it's very difficult to run with the extra weight of the water bottles at my lower back. It's fine for when I'm walking, but not so good when running. Bummer! I feel like I've given it a reasonable try (3 runs now) but I'll ask the coaches on Saturday if they think I should stick with it; the TNT coaches and mentors seem to really love their FuelBelts. However, I can't imagine doing 16-18 miles with the belt, so I think I'll revert to carrying a water bottle in my hand for now.

On the positive side of things, I've also figured out that a packet of Sport Beans about 20 minutes before I start running makes the first 3 miles or so vastly easier to get through. Usually miles 2 and 3 are pretty tough because I haven't quite hit my stride yet, but this doesn't seem to be the case if I've had some Beans! I'm still creeped out by these weird non-food sport supplements, but dang, they seem to do their job well...

It's been a week of new running equipment! I finally got my FuelBelt on Monday. In retrospect, I think it's a good thing that I didn't get it before Saturday's run, because a super long run probably wouldn't have been the best place to test it out. I ran 5 miles on Tuesday with the belt, and it definitely took some getting used to. Figuring out how tightly to wear it and exactly where on my waist/hips I want it to rest will take some practice, plus the feeling of carrying extra weight around my middle is a strange one. Also, yesterday I went and got a new pair of shoes -- identical to the old ones except that instead of being pink with gray and silver trim, these are white with periwinkle and silver trim. They feel exactly the same, but hopefully will be easier on my knees and feet due to not being so worn out.

Andrew will be visiting this weekend, and I haven't been too keen on the idea of giving up our lazy Saturday morning together to go out for a team run at 5am. Fortunately, this week's team run will only be 8-10 miles, which is a manageable distance to do by myself, so I decided that I would do a long run on my own this morning so that I could skip Saturday's run. I went to Reid Park and did 9 miles. The weather was my least favorite for running: mid-80s, humid, and absolutely no breeze. I was drenched in sweat by the 1-mile marker (lovely) and could tell it was going to be a tough run. However, I'm learning that the toughness of any given run has at least as much to do with the weather as with me. This is a useful realization -- not because I can avoid running on the bad-weather days (I can't), but because I'm less likely to start catastrophizing about the implications for my ability to run a marathon in 6 weeks.

Around Mile 7, I was starting to have a pretty bad time: sweat was getting in my eyes, and the FuelBelt was rubbing uncomfortably on my lower back (which was already chafed up from Saturday's run -- darn shorts). So I ended up walking for the first half of Mile 7 and the first half of Mile 8. But then I was able to run in the last mile and a half. Not the most fun run ever, but at least I got the miles in!

Realistically, I probably won't run again until after Andrew leaves. We'll probably go hike on Mount Lemmon at some point over the weekend, so I'll get some exercise that way at least.