What's Next?

Been a while since I blogged. Not too long after that last Rock n Roll Marathon finish I decided to go for the bling and make a trip to the Rock n Roll Country Music Marathon in Nashville, Tennessee. It will be on April 24th. To do this, I tinkered with a training plan and basically came up with what I thought would work coming off the first marathon and having about 8 weeks until the next one.

Unfortunately, I soon found my daughter's spring softball schedule just about killed my training. Each week I felt I was all but out of the hunt for marathon #2 this spring. The deciding factor was whether I could safely run 20 miles a couple of weeks ago. I felt if I didnt wake up and do that on the Saturday morning, then rush to another town and catch up with the softball tournament, then I was not going for #2. Well, I did do the 20 miles and it really didn't feel bad at all after the run. So, I went ahead and registered for the marathon. Basically for the last 8 weeks I have been working in more hill runs, which really aren't hills by any other person's standards. In any case, it was all I had for hills and I suspected the Nashville race wouldn't be too much more.

With the hill runs came a new ITB problem. I had been doing okay with my right kneee and had no real ITB flareup in many months, and nothing to stop my runs. Now, it hit the left knee for the first time ever. That's been two or three weeks now. I blamed the many hills I added into my routine.

Today, I worked in a final 20 mile run and managed with the ITB issue. It kicked in after only 4 miles, but never got unmanageable. Hopefully with the next three weeks of taper until the marathon, it will improve more. I am trying to use the foam roller and some weight workouts to help stretch out both ITBs and strengthen things up.

Next week, I will run the inaugural Gulf Coast Half-Marathon which runs right along the beach at Pensacola, Florida. Should be a fun race and a perfect time for that distance in my taper. I haven't decided whether to run it fairly easy or to take off running and go for a small improvement on a PR! After that race, it's two weeks of "safe" running and then off I go to RnR Nashville!

Well, that's about all. My next blog will probably be after the marathon #2. At that time, I will be eyeing the Triple Crown bling for running three RnR events in a calendar year. Woot!