I think I can, I think I can

Writing this a few days late but the dreaded 22 miler is worth noting. I saw it on the schedule all month and after the 20 miler we did two weeks ago, I would have been more enthused to spend three hours solving complex calculus equations. But I digress.

The route took us from Newport through Covington, over to Cincy, then out Eastern Avenue, a loop around Lunken Bike Path, BACK downtown via Eastern, then a loop around the stadiums and back over the bridge. This route has its plusses and minuses:

- It’s flat, mostly (yay! definitely a plus for a 22 miler)
- We run through some cool parks on Eastern (plus)
- It’s kind of boring and you can see downtown for the entire 5 miles you spend running back via Eastern and the buildings always looks like they are so far away (boo. minus.)
- The bridge at the end of the run is a long and steady incline (sadist coaches. minus!)

I wanted to take this run slow since I destroyed myself running too fast too early in the 20 miler. So I started out with the 10-minute mile group. Really, this is around the pace I’m supposed to be running for long runs according to McMillan. I ran the first few miles slow and was feeling great, so when my running buddy sped up I sped up with her. In fact, I kept up with her until mile 15 (I lost her in mile 5 of our last 20 miler)! We were totally pushing each other around the bike path and she helped me keep my pace back out to Eastern.

Even though I lost her at the 15 mile marker, I held a pretty steady pace by myself AND I wasn’t nearly as surly by the time I got back downtown. (last time I was hating life by mile 19). We did have the option to skip the stadium loop and just do 20, which I seriously considered. I looked at my watch and saw I was WAY ahead of my previous 20-miler time and still feeling ok, so I decided to keep going.

But then I was full-on grouchy by mile 20.5, yelling at myself (in my head) “I’m not having fun at all! why am I doing this??”. A minute later I remembered I was running 22 miles for the first time and that it probably isn’t supposed to be fun. People tell me all the time that I’m crazy for doing a marathon, and I probably SOUND crazy for openly admitting that I talk to myself, but really, don’t judge me unless you yourself have run for three plus hours.

Crazy or sane, I finished the 22 and had an average pace of 9:03. Awesome! I did a little victory dance around my living room before hopping into an ice bath. I’ve graduated to two bags now. A nice end to my first 49 mile week.