I hit a milestone today. I ran 11 miles. It was a little bit unplanned. I was scheduled to do this run this weekend coming up, but I have plans with Adrienne Saturday and was hoping to do it on Friday. However, the weather isn’t looking all that great for the end of the week and I wanted to have some time to rest on the weekend since I enjoyed a nice weekend with the family last weekend. So after battling a migraine yesterday and not really eating well for the day before a long run and drinking next to nothing I was concerned that today wouldn’t be a good day for this run. When I woke up, it was a different story. For a change, I actually got a decent night’s sleep. I watched the news and the forecast and made a spot decision to go for it. I am glad I did. I had my oatmeal and grapes earlier, took a shower to loosen up and headed out around 10:15 am. I returned home around 12:20. The 11 miles took me 2 hours and 5 minutes. The first 3 miles was intimidating because I knew that I had to run that route 2 more times. I was also stiff then and knew that I had to get into my groove. By mile 6 I was feeling good, but then my mind told me I still had 5 more miles to go. But I kept pushing forward had a packet of Gu and plugged on. Around mile 9 I needed another Gu, had water and made another pass up my long hard hill. I ran out of miles at the end. I mapped it out before I left but ended up doing 2/10 of a mile running around my driveway.
I am so glad I ran this distance today and I don’t feel real stiff. I think running 6 miles on the weekend also helped me stay loose for this run. I did my cold bath and have been stretching out with my roller to keep things from getting stiff. I think I am on target to finishing under 2:30 for my first half marathon. Anything less than that will be a bonus.