This afternoon I will be doing my last 12 mile run for a very long time.. next week it’s 8, and then after that it’s 26!
I want to thank my wife — without whom I would have quit when I did that first 8 mile run and discovered that the pain of 8 miles >>> 6 miles… And who has provided awesome post-run support in the form of smoothies. She has also been willing to endure
1. me disappearing for 4 and 5 hour stretches,
2. me coming back like a physical wreck after my runs
3. a trip to Greece.
I also want to thank my FB friends for their support. Without them cheering me on, this whole process would have felt a lot, and I mean a lot, lonelier.
Finally I want to thank my cousin Margarita’s husband who inspired me to run this thing. Now granted he did it in less than 4 hours, and I will hopefully do it in less than 6, but inspiration is where you can find it.
And as a special added bonus, I want to thank my appetite … In spite of running over 400 miles, I only lost 4 pounds. An amazing tribute to a voracious eater…
You’ve been following a pretty standard marathon prep cycle. I always think of it in three stages: The initial build-up to long runs is physical prep, where you build up the strength to do long runs. The set of long runs in the middle is mental prep. It’s not so much building up more physical strength as learning what you have to do to run that far and what it will feel like. The last part (the taper) is actually recovery from the mental prep :).