Training for a May Marathon - Alone

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Received an e-mail this week from our trainer. She's starting a new marathon training program January 13th to prepare us for a spring marathon. I plan on running the United Healthcare Marathon on May 2nd.  But I don't think I'm going to particpate in the training.

I've been turning it over in my mind. I LOVE training with a group and the idea of everyone training without me already has me feeling sad and left behind. But here's the deal:

  • Weekly runs are on Tues/Thurs nights. Tues is probably at the track but Thursday is likely on the roads, in the dark. Even with a headlamp, not my favorite type of running.
  • Long runs are scheduled for Saturdays at 9 AM. I'm a morning runner. Having to wait around until 9 am to run not only trashes my entire morning, but a large chunk of my afternoon, especially when drive time home is factored in.
  • Blair and I are traveling to Egypt in the Spring and will be taking Thursday night courses, so I can't attend at least half of the Thursday night runs anyway.
  • And finally--I'm worried about burn-out. I run the May 2nd marathon b/c it's fun to run a local race. This is a hilly course (and probably hillier this year than last as the venue is being moved from GSO to High Point) so I don't run it with a time-goal in mind. I want to train hard for my fall marathon, and am concerned if I push myself to do full all-out training this spring AND summer, I'll just be sick of running by the time the fall marathon rolls around and not in a good mental state for it.

Last year we had a small group that self-trained for the May marathon. We did long runs together and ran hills once a week. We started training late, near the end of February, and still managed to be in decent shape for the race. So as much as I'd prefer to train with my group, I think I'm going to sit this one out. I'll need to push myself to run hills at least once a week, then I can do long runs either with the Blueliners (a group that meets every Saturday morning at 7:30 am and runs 8-12 miles) or call around and see who I can find. There's got to be some local runners training for this marathon who will need to get some long runs in. Or if I bring my own supplies, maybe the training group will let me sneak in with them for a couple of the longer runs. God forbid, I can try to run them by myelf, but that's a last ditch option. 18 miles all alone is not pretty.

Meanwhile, for anyone keeping score (Oh wait, that would be me) here are a couple of 2008 stats:

Total miles run in 2008: 1294.5

Total # of Yoga classes attended: 118

Wish I could push myself to pull out another 5.5 miles today for an even 1300 miles run, but it's not going to happen. Lots to do and I'm doing a 9 mile run tomorrow with the Blueliners to kick off the New Year. "9 at 9 (am) at the Blue line."

Wishing all of you a glorious end to 2008 and much happiness in 2009.

Dena