Not long now

It's a little daunting to open up the training calendar to see only seven sessions before I'll be running the marathon. This will be my third marathon, my second stand alone marathon. I know I'm in a much better place mentally than this time two years ago. This will be my second attempt at Gold Coast. In 2009 I was seriously considering downgrading to the half, but the Man told me to suck it up. I'd struggled training over that winter and missed a whole lot of sessions. I ended up running it in 5:06:15 at a 7:16/km pace, almost half an hour better than my Ironman marathon. And had such a good day out there that I ended up not giving up on running as I swore I would!

This year I've followed the plan to the best of my ability and trained consistently. There's even been the addition of speed sessions. Unheard of! I'm excited to run this marathon, to have a good day out there. I guess the thing that's playing on my mind is that I've only run 28km in training, rather than the 32km I did last time. There's not much I can do about it now. I have to believe in my training, come up with some positive self talk for when times get tough during the run and focus on nutrition. I am a bandit for putting weight on come taper time!

Run: 36:21 | 5.9km | 6:10/km. Again given the forecast for tomorrow I bought this run forward. Speed session. Main set 15x 30s efforts, 30s jogging recovery. Set the Garmin for Intervals and went for it. Such a good tool.