A Hard Week & Running Buddies – Boston Marathon Training Week 15

A mixed week… with awesome training partners!!!! And not so awesome running.  In retrospect I should have known better. Peak week of training set to happen Holy Week. Yeah, that was a pretty bad idea. I can’t blame my coach for this, since he doesn’t know the life of a pastor during Holy Week. I naively thought that I’d be fine combining a busy work week with lots of miles (for me at least). So what happened? It started out well enough.
Actually it started great. Monday I treated myself to a massage. I felt great! Monday and Tuesday were easy run days. Great!
Wednesday
Unexpectedly (but important), I started Wednesday morning with an early morning drive to Los Angeles…the Federal Building, and office of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). I was there in support of our Oxnard pastors who are being deported (We Shall…). This wasn’t planned but it was certainly important! Hopefully we’ll receive some good news on this one soon!
Workout buddy #1. And then we had Wednesday night track. My assignment was 8×800 (two 800s short of a true Yasso 800 workout). Everyone else was doing a different workout this night. I asked my coach, “still the 800s?” He said, “yes.” So I immediately recruited my friend Maria who runs a bit faster than me to help with pacing. She pulled me through a great workout…the first split was a head pounding 3:47 (probably my fastest 800). Then we slowed down a bit and averaged 3:54 for the remaining 7. This was a great workout and I wouldn’t have been able to do it without her pacing…and the encouragement of others telling me to keep up!

Thursday
This is a rest day as far as running is concerned. The day was filled with preparations for our Last Supper Meal…or what I’d like to do in the future – Dinner Church.
Friday – workout buddy #2
Only five miles today and I ran it at 5am with my friend Brenda. Great conversation in a fog filled morning. I did scare her when I checked my watch…created a shadow with my arm and headlamp…made her scream…then I screamed…she thought the shadow was a big dog.
The day ended with Good Friday worship. I had a headache and went to bed early so I’d be rested for the next day.

Saturday – workout buddy #3
Long rung day. But I had to go the the church’s Easter Egg Hunt first. I greet everyone and read a story (The Tale of the Three Trees). This meant that our long run didn’t start until around 11:00am. I was ok with this because I don’t actually start running the Boston Marathon until 11:15am.
Everything started well enough…except that it was the warmest day in weeks. I started getting tired at mile 9 – way too early! The wheels came off pretty quickly after that. At mile 11ish we stopped at a restroom and doused ourselves with water. That helped for a bit, just a bit. I was able to run to a scheduled walk break at mile 12. But after that I had trouble running more that a couple minutes at a time.
I was exhausted! It wasn’t my legs, but rather just a sense of great fatigue. I’m surprised I was able to make it to almost 20 (19.24). I would say this was my worse run ever. But it wasn’t because I wasn’t running alone. My friend Issa was running with me…walking with me…offering to go and get her car for me…running some more…walking some more…and always encouraging.
I wish this long run had been successful. Then I remembered… getting to Boston wasn’t easy… training for endurance isn’t easy… but it’s all worth it. And regardless of how I feel about Saturday’s run…it was just a run and I GET TO GO AND RUN THE BOSTON MARATHON IN TWO WEEKS.
Today I am thankful for Maria, Brenda, and Issa. You all helped me get through a very hard week!

Here’s my training log: