Hanging on

Reluctantly, my left knee is once again marching along like a good soldier. Oh it still whines, but so far it is not balking at picking my foot up, and putting it back down. Again… and again… and again… and again. Tuesday before I went out to run I was nervous. Would my knee hold up? Would all the work I have put forth so for be wasted? My wife, bless her heart, said it wouldn’t be wasted, but as those miles applied to my goal of running a marathon, well… in that respect it would be for naught.

I have passed 900 miles in my running journey! Hoorah!

Less than 2 months to the marathon now! I know I won’t be able to sleep the night before… which obviously will not help my cause at all. Oh well… I will try to get more rest in the days leading up to it.

Yesterday I was passed for the first time ever on one of my training runs. I feel bad too… because I was stopped at an intersection when I saw the other runner coming up. He was shuffling his feet like he was taking baby steps. I thought to myself… no way can you run fast like that! Well, I headed off in front of him while he took off his jacket, but a few minutes later Mr. Shufflefoot scooted on by me. It is amazing at how many different running styles there are. Serves me right for thinking he couldn’t run fast. Now… I am not a blazer myself… I was running 8:47 miles yesterday on my 8 mile run, but just the mechanics of that stride would seem to work against speed.

Speaking of 8:47… that pace seems to come up a lot on my runs. I think it is my marathon pace… at least for the first run. It is the pace for my first 20 miler. If I kept that pace for a marathon I’d finish in 3:50. If I keep 9:07 pace… I hit right at 4 hours. Honestly… if I managed 8:47 for 20 miles in a training run, I could probably up it quite a bit for the race. Can I ever reach the 7:44 I’d need to qualify for Boston? That will be decided in the future. Right now… 8:47 is my magic pace.