Yesterday evening I completed my last training run before Sunday’s marathon. I’ve been a bit of a slacker when it comes to training updates so today I have four weeks of summaries all in one post. Tomorrow I’ll post my marathon goals and a few pretty graphs that I’ve made to summarize this training cycle. My focus right now is on hydrating, eating well and staying relaxed.

Week 13

I did my usual race week set of 4, 5 and 3 mile runs. It’s worked for me in the past so I see no reason to do anything differently. I decided to skip swim class on Wednesday because I didn’t want to push too hard. Also last week I got a cramp in my right calf and it actually hurt the next day so there was no way I was risking having that happen again. Wednesday’s tempo run was great. Overall I’m feeling good although I will admit to having some tightness in my right leg. It’s not too bad and it’s not consistently a problem so I’m hoping some good stretching and the foam roller will put me on the starting line in good form.

Week 12

This was the week that I gave midterms in both the classes that I’m teaching. I also had a grant application due on Friday. So having to submit the grant, and prepare, administer and grade the exams on top of my usual to do list didn’t leave as much time for running as I would have liked. In fact I missed my mid week tempo run. I’m of the opinion that once a run is lost it’s lost for good so I didn’t try and squeeze it in later in the week. I just reminded myself that the last time I set a half marathon personal best I barely ran in the two weeks before the race.

Week 11

This was the last high mileage week in marathon training. It was also the week that I surpassed the 1000 mile mark in my year to date training. This was almost exactly one week later than last year (Oct 10, 2009). My last long run of 32 km went fairly well. I did fade a bit but I held it together without too much trouble.

Week 10

This was the week after Thanksgiving and there’s something about having a Monday holiday that makes me feel like I’m playing catch-up for the rest of the week. It didn’t help that I went out of town for the weekend so I had to squeeze my long run in after work on Friday evening. It wasn’t ideal but I got it done and it freed me up to do an easy run on Sunday with my friend Laura. Good times.