Jmac- so sorry to hear this.  Glad you shut it down early.  Live to fight another day!  Your in great shape some slow miles will help you much more than anything you could have gained by trying to finish.

Holy crap Cal - that is some stellar pacing. Congrats on the sub 3!

krash NOT what I wanted to hear. 100 miles is stupid far, and HAS to be harder than 3 hours of road running. Has to be. Otherwise I'd be able to convince myself I could go get a buckle and not DNF.

JMac It seems odd you'd be injured only because two or three years ago you'd learned how to avoid it. Lots more easy running instead of hammering out stuff. I hope this isn't from some non-running stuff.

cal legendary stuff man. Two sub 3 marathons is already impressive for me. You doing them just a few months apart is awesome. I hope the rest of life gets a little easier and happier. It sounds like you're kind of down outside of running

dwave/Dave best of luck this weekend at Chicago. I hope the weather holds out for you. I know a local girl running it and I keep telling her how much bigger than CIM it is.

MY WEEK:

I paced a 1:40 half marathon this weekend. Course markings were off. I went out at 7:30/mi pace (1:39:30) and at mile 6 it said I was a minute ahead, but not 1:39:00 ahead. 1:38:30 ahead. Mile 9 I slowed down 10 seconds and it said I was farther ahead. Mile 10 I slowed to an 8:00/mi pace and mile 11 I did the same. I had a racer pass me around 11.5 asking if I was on pace and I said I was and told him it was a short course. When the mile 12 marker WASN'T where I'd expected it to be I was frustrated. I should have known, since there was a 5k and 10k, the 1 mile/12 mile mark would be accurately placed. I was now on 1:40:30 pace so the hammer was dropped. I crossed at 1:39:40 and was disappointed. It was a brand new course, kind of. 95% of the course has been used many times and I know it from memory. The start was changed. It wasn't certified (almost no race locally are) and a half marathon can be 12.96 or 13.2 miles. I expected the mile markers to be accurate, and a similar situation occurred in April (mile markers off while pace hasn't varied). I should have stuck to my guns and kept on 7:35-7:40/mi pace. Instead I drop a 7:20/mi pace to LOOK good on paper but overall I'm not happy. If I had a pacer go out at 7:35/mi, sandbag a few miles in the middle, then run 5k PR effort for the final MILE of a half marathon I'd be irate. Thankfully there wasn't anyone around me for 98% of the race. One guy used me to get through a few miles at 7:38/mi pace. He pulled away when I slowed down/he sped up. Now I know for next year to just run the actual goal pace for these races and ignore the mile markings.

Sadly, since it measured 13.05 it could easily become a certified course and while not absolutely flat it's POSSIBLY a course I could race for a time entry for NYC. Enough people ran sub 90 I'd have something to work with. Instead....everyone will drive to Sacramento for a certified half marathon because no one in town has one, plus the appeal of running at sea level on a flat course is greater than running a hilly half marathon locally.

Weekly for period: From: 09/26/2022 To 10/02/2022

Total distance: 52.80mi

I didn't delete walking. It's more like 40-45 miles of running. Also, I haven't lost my toenail yet. 

Thanks everyone. It feels better this morning than last night. I'm going to try a recovery run this afternoon to see how it is. But wow, I always forget how your legs compensate for an injury. I feel like my right leg is so tight I can barely walk due to the lack of flexibility. Going to be putting in some serious rehab work this week trying to get everything functioning again, regardless of whether I'm running or not.

Chicago - looks like you guys are getting the same weather as us next weekend. I guess the jet stream is dropping south because it's going to drop 20+ degrees in one day here. Talk about a gift! Bad news is - you can't blame the weather if the race doesn't go as planned 

RP - interesting that so few courses are certified by you. I wonder what creates a "certified course" culture. Around me, it's rare that I find a race that isn't certified, unless it's clearly just a charity 5K where the winner runs 19:XX.

Hermosaboy - if you're still around, let us know how the race went. I tracked down your log and it looked like it was warm out?

My week:

Starting to feel like I'm absorbing some of the mileage.  Paces are getting better and I feel really good.  Hopefully not peaking too early with 7 weeks to go

Long run Sunday wasn't supposed to be a workout but the weather was absolutely perfect and legs felt great.  It was windy but that seemed to help keep me at the perfect temp.  It was my first LR without a hydration belt and it felt amazing to ditch the anchor.  I know it's all in my head but I feel faster without little bottles of gatorade strapped to my waist.

The early morning runs are slow but I'm starting to get used to it.

100 mile training is a lot like training for a road marathon. You do all your long runs on pritty trails, you eat real food/ snaks, carry water, hang out with lots of friends and don't have to do speed work. Yes you long runs will take you longer but you can walk the uphills. I only have time to run trail 1-2 times and run road the rest of the time. I eat what I want when I trail run. Mt Dew and donuts work great for me. 

krash NOT what I wanted to hear. 100 miles is stupid far, and HAS to be harder than 3 hours of road running. Has to be. Otherwise I'd be able to convince myself I could go get a buckle and not DNF.

 

Enjoyed this article about Kipchoge's training. It's all very basic stuff (run a ton of miles mostly slow and work in some workouts) but I particularly enjoyed the link to the Kenyan shuffle https://twitter.com/Cathal_Dennehy/status/1450478542957989894 . Amazing to see these athletes "shuffle" along at an 8:30 pace LOL!!

https://www.trailrunnermag.com/training/trail-tips-training/kipchoge-training-takeaways/

 

I think the biggest misconception over the past few years is that Kenyans run all of their easy runs at the "Kenyan shuffle" pace. My understanding is that they start at that pace, often as slow as 9:00-10:00, but will then get to a much quicker speed. The Kipchoge article does reference that, which is nice. I see too many things were people say "he runs a 4:45 marathon and does his easy runs at 9:00 so that's why an 8:30 pace is too fast for your easy run!"

Yeah I've heard this too. It's just for a bit to get themselves warmed up. I think people like the idea of thinking they can get really fast by running really slow.