Taper time!

Last week started with a VO2 max run on Tuesday. 9 miles total with 6x600m at 6:54 pace with a 90 second jog in between. Wednesday was supposed to be a 13 mile run, but it was a struggle early on and I just never felt good. I ended up stopping after 9 miles. Thursday was a 6 mile recovery run with 6x100m strides.

Thursday after work we drove to Shelburne, VT for a bowling tournament. I bowled on Friday and then went out for a 5 mile recovery run. I ended up going faster than I should have for recovery pace, but I felt good. After bowling on Saturday I went into Burlington to run parts of the marathon course that I didn't do last year. It started raining just as I started running. I was running into a cold wind for the first 3 miles. I ran up Battery hill and then out North Ave to the bike path. I didn't take the detours through the neighborhoods that the course takes. I ran the bike path back to Waterfront Park and then back to the van and around the block once to make it an even 10 miles. I was a little surprised that my time was 1:20:02 because I wasn't trying to go that fast and other than being cold and wet I felt good.

I bowled again on Sunday and then we drove home. I had decided to push my long run back a day because of traveling so I ended up with a total of 39 miles for the week. Last night after work I came home and started my 20 mile run at 7:30. I don't know if it was because I'm not used to doing long runs that late or if it's just that I've been training for 21 weeks, but it seemed harder than the last couple of 20 mile runs. I ate my normal long run prep food (ramen soup and ensure plus) when I normally would have had supper and I didn't snack as much during the afternoon as usual. It might have helped if I had eaten a bigger lunch, but I finished the 20 miles. This was my 7th run of 20 miles or more.

This week's miles will be higher than expected for the first week of taper. Nothing significant during the week - I'm skipping the planned 12 mile midweek run because of the long run last night. I'm running the half marathon this Saturday but I'm not racing. I'm going to work on pacing with the goal being to run marathon pace (7:47 planned).