If I was a Rock 'n Pace Bunny ...

The Pftiz plan called for 13 miles today, with 8 eight at marathon pace. As mentioned before, I don't really know what my "marathon pace" is. My goal is to maintain nine-minute miles at the PEI marathon, which would have me finish just under four hours. I would be very happy with that for my first marathon.

Given that I'm still 15 weeks from the marathon, I set my marathon pace today at 9:10 mins/mile.

Rather than the prescribed 13 miles, I ended up doing 14. Why? Well ... it has to do with the fact that I think I'm ready to add more mileage to my long runs (last week I did 15 instead of the planned 12), plus it makes me feel better mentally ... and it's only one more mile! What could possibly go wrong with adding just one more mile?!?

I ended up doing the last eight miles at a 9:09 pace - so close to my goal 9:10 pace! I could become a pace bunny, if there was ever a 14 mile race that required people to run extremely slow for the first six miles, then maintain a not-quite-as-slow pace for the next eight miles. Plus, I would look great wearing big floppy ears. Oh yeah, there was also the matter of me almost getting whiplash from checking my Garmin every eleven seconds or so.

I did the first 6 miles at an easy 9:47 min/per mile pace, with the heart rate averaging around 150. The next 8 miles the heart rate averaged 170, or almost 92% of max, which makes me think that perhaps my "marathon pace" at this point should probably be slower that 9:09 per mile? I did feel quite tired at the end. I probably really won't be sure of what my goal marathon pace will be until we approach October.

For the week, I did 38.4 miles, a bit more than the plan calls for. Next weekend Faith Ann and I are running the Rock 'n Run half marathon in the Miramichi, where I hope to rock 'n set a new PR. However, I plan to rock 'n stick to the Pfitz plan for the week, which means no rock 'n taper for me. The race will replace the planned 14 mile "long run" next Sunday. Here's hoping it won't be too hot that day.

Next week ... the plan jumps from 37 miles to 40, with only two rest/crosstraining days - Monday and Friday - rather than three. That's ok, since that matches the schedule I maintained before taking on Pfitz. The only difference is that previously I was running only about 30-35 miles per week, rather than 40-55.

14 miles, 9:24 mins/mile