I'm in about my seventh week of marathon training for Steamtown Marathon (I didn't have an official start date--or plan--but started doing long runs some time back). Eleven more weeks of training remain. So far, so good. Yesterday morning I ran 15 miles with my friend and training buddy Nicole, and it was (for me) significantly better than last weekend's 12 miles. Part of this was because I'd just started to feel the effects of doing 13- and 14-milers for several weekends in a row without brining my mileage down, but what also helped yesterday's run was that I got to use my new GPS watch, and new running things always make a run better :)
Last weekend, while running the 12 brutal miles at Upper Tampa Bay Trail, my old trusty Garmin Forerunner 305 (now discontinued and significantly more expensive than when I bought it) gave out on me. It had been giving me problems since the Nike Women's Half, back in April, mostly not charging properly and taking an extraordinarily long time to locate satellites, but this was the first time it had actually died in the middle of a long run. Nicole was also having issues with her watch (of the same model) on this particular run, but hers simply wouldn't find those darn satellites. As happenstance would have it, Nicole's watch came alive right as mine went kaput--at mile 8--so, together we were able to record our run with moderate accuracy.
Yesterday's run was slower, but that was intentional. We'd been running our long runs at a pace not much slower than our shorter training runs, which is not only unnecessary but a good way to burn out early in training. It's difficult to go into a double-digit pace when I've worked so hard to stay in the 9s, 8s, and even 7s in my races this past season, but I also know it is necessary. My goal for this marathon is not to finish with a stellar time, but to get through training injury-free and run a solid, consistent race. So far, I'm on target for that goal. Now if only I could get some hill training in for what will be a vastly different landscape from my flat Florida training grounds...
Last weekend, while running the 12 brutal miles at Upper Tampa Bay Trail, my old trusty Garmin Forerunner 305 (now discontinued and significantly more expensive than when I bought it) gave out on me. It had been giving me problems since the Nike Women's Half, back in April, mostly not charging properly and taking an extraordinarily long time to locate satellites, but this was the first time it had actually died in the middle of a long run. Nicole was also having issues with her watch (of the same model) on this particular run, but hers simply wouldn't find those darn satellites. As happenstance would have it, Nicole's watch came alive right as mine went kaput--at mile 8--so, together we were able to record our run with moderate accuracy.
But that experience prompted me to go out later that day to find a new watch. I'd researched them a bit online in the weeks prior, knowing I'd have to come to terms with the new purchase sooner or later (I was hoping for later), so I pretty much knew what I wanted. The 305 had been a great watch for me. It was also my first running watch, so I suppose there is some nostalgia attached to it. But I didn't use many of the features available on the watch, so I was okay with a bit of a downgrade on the next watch. The Garmin Forerunner 210 (which sells for less than that link suggests) still has the features that are most important to me: display of distance, elapsed time, and average pace (which I can also change to current pace, but I don't like to go by that) and tracking of splits each mile. Plus, it's sleeker and lighter and a bit easier to navigate (also a result of having fewer features). One thing that is somewhat of a drawback is the smaller face and number display, but I guess that's what happens when you sacrifice space for design. But I'm really okay with it--I've received numerous inquiries over the years as to what exactly that thing--the 305--was on my wrist. I liked to tell people it was a teletransportation device.
Also, with the 305, I could move the different display settings around and even choose whether I wanted one, two, three, or four functions to display. Of course, once I got the settings I liked most (which are also available on the new one), I never changed them. So I think I'll get used to this one pretty quickly.
Yesterday's run was slower, but that was intentional. We'd been running our long runs at a pace not much slower than our shorter training runs, which is not only unnecessary but a good way to burn out early in training. It's difficult to go into a double-digit pace when I've worked so hard to stay in the 9s, 8s, and even 7s in my races this past season, but I also know it is necessary. My goal for this marathon is not to finish with a stellar time, but to get through training injury-free and run a solid, consistent race. So far, I'm on target for that goal. Now if only I could get some hill training in for what will be a vastly different landscape from my flat Florida training grounds...
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