I’ve signed up for the Glass City Marathon in Toledo, Ohio, and I’m on week 10 of 18 in my slightly modified Pfitz 18/55 plan. The marathon is on April 28, 2019. I’m a few weeks into the Lactate Threshold + Endurance Phase.
Monday: 7 miles + 6 strides. Since it was icy outside, I ran this on the dreadmill. For once, I actually believe what my watch was telling me in terms of pacing. Strides on my dreadmill meant that I could see how fast my dreadmill’s belt can go (6:16 min/mile over 100 meters). Hydrated with Nuun Lemon Lime. 8.01 miles in 1:09:15 (8:39 min/mile pace).
Tuesday: 11 miles w/7 @ HM Pace. Tuesday was a travel day for work. The day started very early – I think my flight was the first passenger flight of the day from CVG. Flew to Manchester, NH via Baltimore, and then had to drive about 90 minutes to Hanover, NH. After I settled in to the hotel room, I went out for a run. Miraculously, I was able to keep in the pace range with a substantial elevation gain (625 feet overall, 344 feet within the HM pace portion). This was helped by the fact that a lot of the sidewalks have been cleared (there was around 6″ of snow on the grass). The HM portion was 55:53 (7:59 min/mile), overall 11 miles in 1:31:58 (8:22 min/mile).
Wednesday: 12 miles. Had to get out early-ish for this one, and it was COLD. Like -2F cold. I had issues with my glasses freezing, and my water froze. I did fuel with a Gatorade Endurance Gel. 12.04 miles in 1:48:55 (9:03 min/mile pace). As soon as I entered the hotel, I made a bee line to the free coffee!
My mouth looks like that because my upper lip is frozen to my mustache. No, I’m not joking. 
Ice in the speedcap of my water bottle. There was also ice inside the bottle.
Thursday: 5 miles. Hotel dreadmill. Why is it that every hotel has heat in the exercise room? The dreadmill was nicer than mine, but at one point my watch started telling me I was going slower when I wasn’t. 5.01 miles in 43:58 (8:47 min/mile pace).
Friday: This was my last morning waking up on the New Hampshire-Vermont border, and I was traveling and had two morning conference calls. Of course, the travel here is the reverse of Tuesday, a 90 minute drive to Manchester, a flight to Baltimore, a flight to Cincinnati, and then my drive. This took all day and given the temperature in the early morning, I discussed with my wife letting me run 20 miles on a Saturday…
Saturday: 20 miles. I got up at 4:15 and went down to the ORT Trailhead at Lunken Airport. Ran into downtown, through the park (which was setting up for a race), around the Bengals Practice Field, across the Clay Wade Bailey Bridge, then the Taylor-Southgate Bridge, then the Suspension Bridge, and finally the Purple People Bridge (where I saw the race’s finish line). On my way east, there were a bunch of training groups out running the opposite direction. And I was chased by a rooster (it smartly backed off when I yelled at it – I wouldn’t have minded throwing it on my grill had it persisted). I should have cut out something, though, as when my watch clicked 20 miles, I was still almost two miles from the parking lot. I certainly wasn’t going to walk the 2 miles, so I kept running and still felt good at the end. 21.59 miles in 3:11:01 (8:51 min/mile pace). This was a confidence builder, because I felt great despite it being the third double-digit run this week.
Overall, I ran 57.65 miles this week. I’m fairly certain that’s the most I’ve run in a week, since that’s the first time I’ve ever run three double-digit runs in one week. This plan is not for the faint of heart. On to the next!