Marathon Training: Day 27/118

I've run 105 kms now after almost 4 weeks (tomorrow is a scheduled rest day) and yesterday I ran 1/4 marathon and recovered just fine - no soreness at all.

Salomé has me training 6 days a week:

• Mon - crosstraining with increasing time each week
• Tues - increasingly long runs doing speed intervals or hill training
• Wed - short run
• Thurs - medium runs at a harder pace
• Fri - longest run of the week
• Sat - short run

My comfortable running speed is 10.6 km/hr which is a perfect pace for finishing the marathon in four hours. I've been doing all of my runs after school or during the last block if I have a prep. The gym is almost always empty except for a senior student trying to beef up so he can become a firefighter.

My routine is change, sip a bit of water, run my run on the treadmill while listening to The National's High Violet or Mumford and Son's Sigh No More. When I reach my distance, I hit cool down and get to a walk where I can drink water without spilling it all over myself. Then I add water to my energy drink (whey protein powder and a thawed cube of blended berries) and slurp it up while stretching my calves, quads, glutes, hams, adductors and abductors.

I ran outside today since I had no plans to go to the school and it was an atypical February afternoon: 13°C. I was a little worried that I wouldn't be able to keep a good pace without the treadmill so I timed my run and averaged under 6 min/km which is on track. I mapped my distance with Google Maps.

This last week was the first week running with actual running clothes. I picked up some Nike shorts and shirt - light weight, breathable, and they show off my hairy shoulders. My sweat pants and golfing shorts weren't cutting it before.



This is the dime-sized blister I popped a couple days ago, applied some Polysporine and a bandaid and it was as good as new. You can see the other blister-turned-callous above it too.

As far as pain, I haven't had much except for the first 3-4 minutes of running where I can really feel it in my shins.  I had a bit of numbness in my hands, but having spoken to my doctor friend who coaches at my school, he said it was nothing to worry about - blood simply goes where it's needed and my hand's don't really need it when I'm running. He also coached me to run without really swinging my arms since it uses energy unnecessarily - a tough habit to break, plus I look a little gimped. He's a kidney specialist so he urged me to look up an electrolyte recipe online to make my own sugar/salt drink to restore my body chemistry after long runs. I sweat like a dog.

Sleep is precious. I am recognizing that I need much more of it now that I am so much more physically active. And I'm so hungry all the time.