Rest week

This week I am in full rest mode in final preparation for the Kansas City Marathon. There are just two short, easy runs scheduled. I did the first one today: 4.62 miles at an average pace of  9:58. The only other run is to be 3 miles at a very easy pace, probably something like 11 min. per mile, which I'll do on Thursday. In between I will lift weights a couple of times, stretch, and possibly ride the eliptical trainer.

Over the weekend I ran 13.1 miles on Friday and then 4.3 on Saturday. The Friday run was scheduled to be 12 miles, but once I got going I figured I might as well make it a complete half marathon. I didn't intend to run it fast, but as the run progressed, my pace fell naturally, so I just kept it up. I finished with a 1:57:06. That's a pretty good half marathon race for a person my age, much less a training run, and I was very encouraged by it.

Thinking about my strategy for the race on Oct. 20, I looked up how I ran my fastest marathon - 3:52:08 in Kansas City in 2008 - to see how I did it. That was a perfect day for running: cool but not cold and it never got warm at all. No rain, no wind. Apparently I was in pretty good shape. My watch stopped working after mile 8, so I don't have splits for the whole way, but I was officially timed at 2:00:44 for the first half marathon, and then finished up with a 1:51:22.

With that in mind, on race day I will shoot for a 2:01 opening half, and then hope for a negative split and possibly a sub-4-hour race. Last year there were only 19 men in my division in Kansas City, and only four of them beat 4 hours. I know I'm capable of breaking 4 hours, but I realize anything can happen in a marathon, so I'm prepared to take what the race gives me. But if everything holds together I just might surprise myself.