Monday, February 23, 2009

Marathon Plans

My plans to run the LA marathon were changed for me when they decided to move it from February to May.  Fortunately, another race came along-- the Hard Corps Marathon at Camp Pendleton.  I'm psyched to be running the inaugural event, and i'm happy that it's close to home.

Initially, i had hoped to make this another attempt at a sub 3-hr marathon, but my hip has been bothering me so much that i've cut back my training a bit.  Rather than doing the 70 mile/week program that i originally started, i'm following Hal Higdon's Advanced II program, which is 6 days a week but lower mileage.  I'm still training for 6:45/mile pace, but realistically i don't think i can manage that for a full 26 miles.  At this point, i'm hoping to just qualify for Boston in 2010. Since i'm in a new age group, i only have to run 3:30 or better.

If i can magically make my hip better, i hope to run a fall marathon also, but i haven't picked a race.  Ideally, that would be a more serious attempt at sub-3.