Spring Marathon training started this week. Am I ready for this again?

Yesterday was my first official training run for the Spring Marathon season. As I mentioned previously, I am planning on running the full marathon at the 10th Anniversary Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon on April 25th. The last (and only) time I ran a full marathon was in Chicago in 2006. Unlike the training for that run, I do know what I’m getting into… the long runs, the time commitment. I’m not nervous per se about if I *can* do it, but rather *how* I’m actually going to get it done this time. Last time Matt and my friend Dana’s husband were so helpful, picking us up in various places and dropping food and water for us. This time, Matt will be far, far away! That’s one of the reasons I am so thankful that I’ve found such a wonderful training group, runHers. It will be so nice to have other girls to run with, as well as planned water and Gu stops.

This is Dana and me after we ran the Chicago Marathon in 2006.

Other things that are different about this run are that I am usually pretty die hard when it comes to training plans. I follow them TO. THE. LETTER. I rarely deviate from what I’m supposed to do. However, I learned something from training for the 2009 OKC Memorial Half and the Tulsa Route 66 Half that I just did. In the spring, I trained SO hard. Ran hard almost every run. It was tough. But the race was even more tough. Conditions weren’t good, I didn’t feel good, and the race was bad for me. It was really hard for me to take that I didn’t do well.

After that, I kind of just took the summer off. Oh, I ran – of course. But I did it for fun. I ran with my girlfriends, Amy and Abbie and with runHers, and we just had fun. Talked, laughed and had a good time. When it came time to start training for the Tulsa Route 66 Half, I asked my friend and pseudo-trainer what I should do to prepare. He suggested that I just run – if I felt good that day, run hard, do hills. If I didn’t feel great, run easy. Log my long runs, but run how I felt. What?? No plan!? You can tell how this would affect my compulsive exercise personality.

Turns out, that kind of running was exactly what I needed to do. Abbie and I went to Tulsa, after I had been on a whirl-wind trip to Washington State with Matt. We had a good dinner the night before, had a fairly decent night’s sleep, got up the next morning and just ran. And we did great! We both PR’d (set a personal record).

Abbie and me after the Tulsa Route 66 Half-Marathon

So, yesterday, I went out in the 30 degree temperatures and ran my first training run. 5 miles with 8 x 400m intervals. I don’t really have a “plan” that I’m following. I will probably end up doing a combo of the plan I did in 2006, the runHers plan and a bit of just how I’m feeling that day.

Haha. This is what it looks like to run in 20 degree weather. This is my friend Amy and me last year. We try not to run by banks.

Ok, here’s what my playlist looks like this week. A “me” mix of my indie music & Top 40. Not too much hard core stuff in there this week.

TiK ToK – Ke$ha (I know, don’t judge!)
Down – Jay Sean
Hey, Soul Sister – Train
Paper Planes – MIA
Jezebel – Two Hours Traffic
Enjoy the Silence – Anberlin
Boom Boom Pow – Black Eyed Peas
Church – T-Pain
Halo (Mysto & Pizzi Dance Remix) – Beyonce
Sweetest Girl – Wyclef Jean
Lights Out – Santigold
Whatcha Say – Jason Derulo
Love in this Club – Usher
Replay – Iyaz
Bad Romance – Lady Gaga

I usually enjoy running with my girlfriends, and probably would prefer that. But, I also love a good run by myself. It’s funny the things that go through your mind when it’s just you, your iPod playlist and the road. Here are a few of the things I thought about while running yesterday:
-How am I going to log these runs with Matt off in Washington, especially when the mid-week long gets up around 8 miles?
-Why do intervals always seem to start right when you’re about to go up a hill?
-Who will I run with after I move? I’m going to miss my friends so much. Sigh.
-It’s really creepy when you can hear the buzzing and whirring noise of the electrical lines above you.
-Why does Lil Wayne “get that girl from overseas” (in the song Down by Jay Sean)? Is she a model? A sweatshop girl? I don’t get it.

The run went well, by the 8th interval I was dead. I was trying to stay under an 8:00 mile, but didn’t on the last 400. So, it was 8:02… Compulsive exerciser, remember?

Tagged as: Friends, Kami, Marathon, OKC Memorial, Pictures