With 158 days until the NYC Marathon, I’m working hard to get my base to a good place. 

This morning I ran 3.5 miles in 41 minutes. I cut my 5k time by 5 minutes from yesterday. My chest cold is FINALLY going away. If only I could find a good running route around my neighborhood. I’ve been treadmill running, but hopefully the weather wont kill me soon so I can run in central park after work. I really want to own the last 4 miles of the marathon because its a place where I know the route like the back of my hand.

So after I got into the marathon I was really in the zone with my running, then I moved and got a cold. My running went from 20mi a week to about 5, and in the past 2 weeks I’ve run only 4 miles, three of which were today. But today is a new start. Today is the day I officially working hard on my base before I start my official training program in July. No more excuses.

I’m using the NYC Marathon training schedule. I did Hal Hidgon’s half marathon training program and it was good but his marathon training program only has you hitting 20 miles once and I want to do it at least twice, if not three times before the actual marathon. 

My run today was good, I’m still not 100% from this chest cold, but I def got two good miles in at my usual pace and I walked a cool down mile. I look forward to really getting my milage back up. 

I now have a new countdown: The 2012 NYC ING Marathon on November 4th! I guess I’m just one of those people with beginners luck. I’m so excited to start training for it! Its going to be a wonderful year. 

For easter my lovely mother got me one of those fancy running watches. I’m such a tech nerd that I love it. This is the Nike + GPS with tomtom watch. Its pretty swell.

The cons:

-It took forever to sync with the gps sensors. I got kinda bored just standing around so I decided to start running and it picked up the signal soon after running. 

-The USB port is protected by this thin piece of plastic. I have a terrible feeling one day I’ll break it and then the USB port will be destroyed. I mean as long as I can see my immediate run on the watch I’ll be fine. But its nice to have my runs automatically synced. 

The Pros:

-Its very thin so its not bulky

-It does what it is supposed to do so I can measure my distance/pace/calories/time

-I love it

I’m excited to see how my running will change with me being more aware of what I’m doing. I can only get better.

The park is really lovely this time of year. I’m still trying to understand this running just to run schedule but for the moment, running in the park is the best feeling ever. It was just so beautiful that I wanted to stop and take a photo. My allergies were killing me yesterday, but I powered through and had a great run. 

For Easter my mom ordered me a fancy running watch. I’m looking forward to getting out there with the watch to work on having a steady pace. I’m thinking about starting another training plan…or maybe I should find a race first then start a training program. 

for the first time since the half on Saturday. To be honest, my half was a horrible run day. I over hydrated, it was hot, hilly and I didn’t have my music. I was hoping to be swept up by the excitement of the race but I just wasn’t. Today starts the first day of me running just to run. No goals, just to be strong. It’s much scarier because its easier to fall off the wagon. Its been 3 days since my last run and I feel like crap so its time to lace up those shoes and head out the door.

I can’t believe how fast the 12 weeks of training went by! So this past weekend was the Rock ‘N’ Roll Half Marathon in Washington D.C.

The expo was really great. I’ve attended these for my moms marathons and this one was well planned out. I even got to test drive a car and get a gift card to Target. It was a great way to spend the day before the race. I feel a little more like a legit runner now that I have a race t-shirt for a race that I was in.

The actual race started out really fun. They were blasting top 40 as we crossed the starting line and that was fun. It was great knowing that the next band was only a mile away but I should have brought my iPod for the times I wasn’t within earshot of a band.

I loved the crowds when there were some, my favorite was a man dressed as a Ketchup bottle holding a sign that says “Catch Up!” I also loved that one of the bands along the course was a bunch of kids playing Lady Gaga’s “Just Dance” on the steel drums. That was pretty awesome. I loved the people who just lived along the course too. People were hanging out outside drinking and playing music. Some people were actually handing out beer to runners. I love a good St. Patricks Day race.

I finished in 3:06:00 which is slower than I would have liked, I was aiming for 2:45:00 but I wasn’t a smart runner. Going forward:

-I will actually train longer than 12 weeks before I run a half again. That was crazy and the wall just got me. For the next one I want to be stronger and faster.
-I will bring my iPod, I’ve trained with music, I don’t know why I didn’t run with it.
-I will train on harder hills. There were two or three hills plus inclines, Central park where I’ve been training has a few hills, but not similar enough to the course
-I will not over-hydrate. It was horrible on the course waiting in line for a bathroom. That was 10 minutes I could have had back on my time.
-I will be a smart runner. Now that I’ve done this race I know where I need to go. Now all I need is a running group!

All in all it was a good day and now on to the next race.

Well, here we are…at the end of this training cycle. My conditioning runs this week were horrible. First I switched my rest day from Tuesday to Monday in order to give my muscles a little rest. Then on Tuesday I tried a new gym in midtown and it was absolutely horrible. There were too many people for machines that didn’t work and it was way too hot to work out. So I left. I know that was horrible and whimpy of me but with being so close to the half I didn’t want to risk a bad workout and get injured. The other two conditioning runs were fine, nothing to talk about but my long run was completely fantastic

I decided that because I hit 11 miles last weekend I would just run today. It was a nice day and I ended up hitting 11.5 miles. I’m a little sore right now and I’m planning on stretching out on the foam roller in a few minutes. Tomorrow I face the epic sport of NYC Brunch, a few hours of eating, drinking and talking followed by two more runs then travel to DC for the half marathon!

I can’t believe that I’m almost at the end of my training for my first half marathon. However, I just had the most amazing long run this weekend. I planned to run 10 miles however I ended up doing 11. It was a beautiful, windy day out and somewhere around mile 7 I stopped feeling tired and really just enjoyed my run! I can’t explain it, but it was the greatest runners high I have ever felt! 

I’m super thankful that I haven’t gotten injured running. I just seem to hurt myself when I’m not running that is the problem. After my long run on Saturday I went to see a movie and was taking the bus back up and I banged the side of my knee against the seat. Then on Sunday I was cutting chicken and I totally took a chunk out of my finger. So I now have a bruise on my knee and a hole in my finger. On top of that my muscles are kinda sore so I’m swapping my work out today for my rest day tomorrow.

Only 6 more runs until 13.1 

So its time for my two month check in. I have 7 more runs in 16 days left before my first Half Marathon. I’m very excited and I’m gonna go shopping this weekend for some new running clothes to wear on the half. 

As far as my weight loss goes, it is pretty much the same as last month. I didn’t lose any weight this month but my endurance is getting better. Today I ran 2.5 miles without slowing down and/or wanting to stop and walk. I have better runs in the morning so I’ll try and keep this up next week. My goal is to lose 15lbs this half marathon training. So far I’ve lost 10. My ultimate goal is to have a healthy bmi.

I’m extremely happy to be at this point. A few months ago this wasn’t even possible, and now a 5 mile run is no big deal. I get the Timehop emails (my social media posts from a year ago) every day and a year ago I consumed as many calories in a single meal that today I normally eat in a day and a half. Its nice to be on the other side now. It makes me want to do a dance like Abe the time travelling dinosaur from Timehop.