Marathon Training

I ran 18 miles today.

Wow.

For some reason, that distance seems ludicrously long in a way that all the previous ones didn't.  I ran very nearly that far last week, but this seems like it ought to be on a different scale, somehow.

It was a good run, but a hard one.  I was talking to a good friend of mine this morning who attempted an 18-miler yesterday in a group, but her group leader set waaaaaay too fast of a pace and so she did 16 miles and felt too shredded to do the last two miles.  Her story made me feel really lucky, because I haven't had a bad long run in a while, and a bad long run is just a terrible thing to try to recover from.  It is awful to be physically exhausted, emotionally tapped and mentally shaken by a really grueling run.  So, yes, this wasn't a magical run like my last few have been.  I didn't hit a pace where I felt I could run forever, I didn't get a rush from pushing my pace up and up and up the last three miles, I didn't soar.  But it wasn't a bad run, either.  I just ran, and ran, and ran.  For three and half hours.  I had to tell my legs to take each step, and I was counting down the miles a little desperately toward the end, but it was doable.

Though I'd rather have that I-can-run-forever feeling, I was glad to have a run like this, because if race day doesn't come with a magical runner's high,  I need to be able to push through and just run and run and run, to take each step deliberately and with the knowledge of how many came before it and how many will have to come after.  I have to be able to look down the barrel of 26.2 miles and just get it done, if it comes to that.