camille: thanks for starting the January thread. I still need to lose about 4-5 lbs myself to get back to the weight I was at when I was racing my best. Yes, I just signed up for the Atlanta Marathon before the price went up. I do want to travel sometime fairly soon for a flatter race with better PR chances, but maybe by October I can be in decent shape to run a pretty good time on these hills. I have not run the new version of the Atlanta Marathon, did the old Thanksgiving  Day one on the Olympic course as my first in 2002. Have fun in the free half in Columbus if you run it.

Got in about 5 very easy this morning, still some residual soreness in the calves. Will run another 5 later. Have a great day, everyone!

Camille - I don't think that the Chickamauga Battlefield Marathon/HM registration has started yet, though it is listed on the Chattanooga Track Club's page ( www.chattanoogatrackclub.org ). The Chickamauga Chase 15K, slated for April 20, is still open. I signed up through active.com. The race's own web site needs to be updated.

I see the Locomotive Half listed on the CTC web site, but I couldn't possibly be ready for that. I'm more-or-less training for the 15K races in March and April now.

Oh, as you probably saw, the 4 mile Karen Lawrence Run on 12/31 went well. Measured 4.36 miles, completed in 36:45 gun time. Given the hills and all, I'm happy with that. I think you already saw the race report.

It's going to be a busy year - I have 5 substantial (15K and above) runs for which I've signed up already...

3/9 - Gate River Run 15K, Jacksonville, FL

4/20 - Chickamauga Chase 15K, Ft. Oglethorpe, GA

6/16 - Towpath 10-10 10 mi, Valley View, OH

9/8 - River Run HM, 13.1 mi, Berea, OH

10/20 - 4 Bridges HM, 13.1 mi, Chattanooga, TN

I'll also throw in a few 5K-10K runs, I'm sure. Including the Chattanooga Chase 8K on 4/27.

Hi rainmaker! Nice progressive run.

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Hi Tom! Looks like you've got a good schedule of races in various places planned.

Congrats on the AG win, camille!! That's awesome--glad you had a great time. Yep, I did the full at the GA Marathon that inaugural year when they ran out of water. I always say I "did" that marathon, not that I ran it, because I had to walk large portions of it. I was about 30 lbs overweight at the time and I did it on really minimal training.

I ran 8 this morning with the training group at Phidippides, parts of it at a little faster than MP. Planning an easy 14 or so tomorrow as long as the legs cooperate. If I do that, I will be close to 60 miles for the week.

Happy running, everyone!

Hi all!

How's everyone's running going?

Training for the Georgia Marathon continues to go pretty well, I think. Pretty sure I have a decent chance of going sub 3:55 or maybe even a little better. Running the MLK Day 5K on Monday to check my progress, will be my first race since the 10K at the beginning of December. I've normally trained solo (except for track and x-c when I was in school many years ago), but lately I've been going to a lot of group runs, like at  local running stores and other places. Also planning the Intown Ten (10K) in Va-High a couple weeks before the marathon.

Hi, all!  Marathon training continues to go well for me also.

NTS - I was at the MLK Day 5K as well.  What'd you think of the race and the course?

camille - Nice job at Houston. I heard that the conditions were pretty tough.  I'll probably also be running the Locomotive Half (as a tune-up race for the Publix Georgia Marathon).

OK, here's my RR from MLK Day 5K 1/21 (reposting from Marathoner Dailies):

This was way off the kind of time I'd been hoping for. I think my legs were still a little tired from the longer run on Sat. Also, I obviously ran a little longer than 5K since it was a certified course, but had a very wide starting line so that anyone not in the center ran a bit longer (gun time only due to the wide start line). The hills were not too bad, but the course had a lot of turns. Weather was nice, probably high 30s by start time.

The start was on grass, and instead of a gun, the signal was a bell, and not a very loud one, so that many people, including myself, did not realize that had been the start signal until we saw that people were running.  I charged across the grass field (a bit muddy in spots due to all the rain we've had lately) a little faster than planned in the first 30 sec, trying to get in a decent position before the course narrowed onto the asphalt path. According to my Garmin at the time (average pace, not instantaneous) I was running well under 7 mm during this time (actually closer to 6), though not sure how accurate that is with the number of points and the fact my pace was not constant. So I began forcing myself to slow down, just as we hit a short but fairly steep uphill, still on the grass. I slowed way down and suddenly my avg. pace was over 8. At 0.2 mi in, I  saw some people around me starting to walk.

Mile 1 came in a little slow, but it had the most uphill. Mile 2 had a lot of downhill and I got closer to my planned pace, but still felt a bit sluggish and breathing felt hard (it's a 5K, duh!). Mile 3 (first half of this was a little uphill again) started to drop way off the pace. I knew the rest of the course was not too tough, but just could not find the extra oomph to get back close to pace. Legs were not happy. Second half of mile 3 (downhill now) was better, since I knew the finish was close, but 3rd mile overall was still much slower than 1 and 2. Managed a bit of a kick toward the finish (last part was on grass again), back to under 7mm again.  Right after the finish, realized I was walking with a limp. The troublesome left knee felt fine during the race, but dull pain kicked in just after.

The knee made the cooldown jog pretty tough, gave up and started walking after a little over a mile, but it almost hurt worse walking than running. Icing it now, and I scrapped the short recovery run I had planned for tomorrow.

The course map is public in my log, in case anyone would like to view it. Gun time was 25:27 (30 sec slower than in September when I was just starting to really train again!), AG 1/103.

During the pre-race warmup jog, my HR was a bit high for the pace (might have been the race day excitement), but when I looked at my racing HR after the race (did not have it on screen during race), it was really low for a 5K. I wonder if my legs being just a bit tired from Saturday kept me from going as fast as I otherwise could have (even though, from the point of view of breathing/perceived exertion. I did feel like I  was really pushing it).