I made a (masochistic and crazy?!) decision late last year that after running two half marathons, I felt like I was ready to take the next step......and run the 42.2km's that is the marathon!
I'm proud of and a little bit overwhelmed about the decision but looking forward to giving it everything I've got! If you'd told me I'd even be considering this 2 years ago, I'd tell you you're nuts!
My intention is to 'tick' this off the bucket list, do it once and only once so I want to run it in a decent (and achievable) time, so the goal is to complete the marathon in under four hours.
And so the location and date was decided, heading back to Gold Coast Marathon Festival on July 6 this year.
And so here I am, 12 weeks out from the big day, feeling pretty confident at this stage.
This confidence is only a new thing, 6 weeks ago I worked with Mel to sort about my plan and even though I knew what was in store for me, seeing it there in black and white on paper scared the shit out of me! I was questioning whether I really wanted to do it, was it worth it? It just seemed like so much sacrifice and effort and it was tempting to settle for a smaller goal....or no goal at all! I'm thinking (and hoping!) denial is normal at the start of any goal this big... and as they say, if your dream doesn't scare you, it's not big enough! I had to realise that it's something I truly WANT to achieve and my ultimate reason pushing me is I want to achieve this before I start a family.
Apart from training with our running crew for interval and speed work, I'd always done all my long runs alone. I've never really minded it but when I'm now faced with long runs up to 3 hours, I'm excited to say I have a training partner now!
I've been running with Lisa in our running crew for a couple of years now, she ran 4.04 for her first marathon at Melbourne Marathon last year and is aiming for under four hours at Gold Coast also. We run at a very similar pace and have planned to do most of our long runs together. I can't tell you how much it makes the thought of slogging out the 2 hour+ runs early on a Saturday morning in the middle of Winter that much easier!
So I officially started training 5 weeks ago, building up to 18km's 2 weeks ago, followed by an unintentional rest week due to a stomach virus and 15km's at Run for the Kids this past weekend. Run for the Kids is my favourite fun run of them all and I kinda feel like I'm a real runner now that I've done the same race 3 years in a row, not just a fad anymore! I was really happy with my result, I finished in 1 hour 16 - 3 mins faster than last year and a total 10 mins of my first attempt in 2012.
So apart from work and some sort of social life, each week will be pretty full on. I'm lucky to have a great support team (especially my hubby who is already helping out alot at home) Each week kinda looks like this: long interval/hills session and a speed work session with our running crew, an easy 30-45 min steady run on my own and a long run once a week, building up to 32km's. Along with 2-3 FIRE (weight) sessions with Mel a week, daily stretching, regular massages and maintaining 95% compliance with my nutrition.
I think about it as only being 3 months out of my life and I know the result with be so worth it!
I will be blogging as much as possible over the next 12 weeks so here goes nothing...hope you'll join me on the journey to the start line!
Awesome goal chick! and all the best for your training!!
ReplyDeleteThanks babe xx
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