Day 43 - Only 45 Days Left Until the London Marathon

Hi,

I feel great today. The extra day of rest was a brilliant idea.

This morning I got another session of stretching in this morning. I wish I could make time for this every morning. It gets blood circulating throughout your body and really wakes you up. I felt completely refreshed.

Tonight I met my trainer. His name is Rueben. He is a professional body builder, about my height, latin ethnicity, not overly big but you can tell he's all muscle. He seems like a real no BS kinda of guy and I can appreciate that. The appointment tonight was mostly to get measurements taken and discuss goals, eating, etc.

He is confident that he can get me down eight pounds before the marathon. I guess we'll see. I've platueaed on any type of weightloss now for more than a month. Not gaining or losing, staying flat around 180 lbs. His scale said 183, must be the food and water I've had during the day because there is no way I gained 3 lbs since this morning.

After the consultation, I headed to the Gold's Cardio Theatre and jumped right into my 11 mile run with a mid seven pace. My legs were feeling spectacular so why not go for it. I was surprised after 4 miles that I was able to keep the pace. Transporter 3 was playing in the theatre and kept my focus off of the dials on the treadmill. Before I knew it, I was at 7 miles. I had to bring the speed down on the treadmill but couldn't help but think about getting a time in the sevens for my 11 mile run. With only four miles to go, I very carefully adjusted the speed up and down trying to maintain an overall average in the sevens. At 9.5 miles, I was starting to fatigue and had to drop the speed way down. I let myself recover for the next .75 miles and then cranked the speed up into a high six minute pace staying there through the finish. Although a treadmill run, I was really proud of this run.

Fastest time for any run over 10miles.

Stats: 11 miles - 1:27:53 time - 7:58 pace

Looking for to a distance PR this weekend in St. Louis. Dragging my brother along for as far as he can run.

~RunFlickRun~

Day 41 - Only 47 Days Left Until the London Marathon

Hi,

I started out today’s run very skeptical. That said, my overall physical condition improved greatly overnight. The ice and ibuprofen must have done their job. Even then, I had that feeling where you know you’re not quite better and feel somewhat fragile.

Backing up a bit, I started my gym membership today at Gold’s. I was expecting the whole sign-up process to be very quick. It took almost 45 mins. The guy helping me was great, showed me around, very personable, talked me through all the options but took a long time doing it all. This is an important detail because I had dinner plans at 8pm with Elise and Blake. I needed to finish my run by 7:30pm to allow enough time to shower and get to the restaurant. I got to the gym at 6:20 with only 3 miles on the agenda. I thought that would be plenty of time. After 45 minutes getting setup and then changing, it was already 7:15pm.

Back to the beginning of my run. I was starting slow based on my state of being but was heavily pressed for time. After a minute or so, I decided to just go for it.

…another side note…I was in Gold’s Cardio Theatre which is one of my new favorite places to run. They have a huge room of treadmills, elliptical machines, bikes, etc. with a movie screen and the lights down extra low. This will be the only exception I make when it comes to my hate for treadmills.

I ramped the treadmill up to a 6:50 pace and focused on my breathing. The movie (The Killers) was a helpful distraction but after 9mins, even with good breathing, I was feeling the burn. I upped the speed again to drop into a 6:45 pace, held that for awhile and had to start backing it off. Closer to the end of the run I was trying desperately to get my time back into an average sub-7 minute pace but my lungs wouldn’t carry me there.

Although I didn’t break 7, I did set a new time PR.

Stats: 3 miles – 21:32 time – 7:10 pace

Look forward to breaking 7 in the weeks to come. I haven’t shared this publicly before, but I have a 5K goal after my marathon pursuits. I want to run sub-20 5Ks. Fast enough to place top 10 in a couple of races. I’ll be the chunkiest guy in the top 10, guaranteed.

~RunFlickRun~