Image by zharth via Flickr

Thursday night: 

Me:  What time is it daylight in the morning?

Husband:  Around 7:10

Me:  Oh, okay.  I’m gonna wake up and start running at 7:00.

Friday morning at 6:40 a.m.:

Alarm: Put a Ring On It – click to listen 🙂

Me:  hit snooze

Repeat twice, then on third alarm, turn off… 

So, I woke up at 7:20.  It was daylight, by the way. 

I was not in the mood to run when I woke up.  To add to the frustration, I needed to be FINISHED running by 10 to do some other things that I’d scheduled.  Hmmm…..  I dragged myself around the house stalling at every chance possible until I decided to change plans and do my little errand BEFORE running.  Now, it gets harder and harder for me to get out and run the later it gets in the day so I’m not sure why I thought this schedule switch was a good idea.  Whatever.

While looking in the mirror to put my contacts in, I decided to quit training for the stupid marathon.  Who am I kidding?  I am dreading a run that isn’t even HALF of the marathon.  So, I quit.

Then, I decided to NOT quit.  I still have 3 months to train.  Of course I can’t run 26 miles today.  Duh!

So, I took care of my errand and came home to start my run at 9:35.  It was cold and the wind was blowing – in my face.  That was the crappy part.  On the bright side, the sky was clear, all of the schools had already started so there weren’t any buses or bikes or kids lined up waiting on the sidewalk – just me, myself and I.

The first couple of miles were tough – as usual.  I always start off sluggish and eventually get into a running rhythm.  My knee felt okay but my legs felt tight and stiff.  I decided to take a one minute walk break after every one and a half miles.  The marathon that I’m training for has water stations at the same spacing, so I figured I’d just get ready for it now.  After about two miles, I had to stop and stretch my legs a little bit.  It helped some but I was still tight.  Ugh.

I chugged along and finished the run just under 13 minutes per mile.  Not blazing, but I was happy.  I ran this long run faster than last week.

So, I still have 4 miles to run tomorrow.  (I switched my Friday and Saturday runs so I could participate in a 5K tomorrow.)

Here’s what my week has been like:

• Monday:  5 miles
• Tuesday:  4 miles (on my birthday!)
• Wednesday:  4 miles
• Thursday:  off
• Friday:  10 miles
• Saturday:  need to run 4 miles…

I am tired but glad to have made it to Friday again!  I’ve run 23 miles this week – pretty sure I can make it to 27 again.  Week 4:  done! (okay, almost…)

Next week – Week 5

• Monday:  5
• Tuesday:  6
• Wednesday:  3
• Friday:  4
• Saturday:  11