Planning for 13.1 in 75 days

I have very few pictures to share because I've pulled them off my phone, but haven't posted them to Shutterfly to print (I think I am one of the few people who actually still prints pictures and puts them into albums). I am very far behind - Once Halloween is over, I have to review all my pictures from mid-July through October 31.

So what is missing is our extra long weekend to Vermont over Columbus Day weekend. The leaves were absolutely beautiful!  We hiked a 4,000+ mountain (6.25 miles round trip!) with over 2,500 feet of elevation gain. And we ate and drove around.

But since 2 weeks ago I have done ZERO exercise until yesterday. With my complete lack of movement I was thinking about bailing on my 1/2 marathon in 75 days (yes, slightly less than 11 weeks). Originally I had been planning on running 7 miles every weekend starting last weekend and going through mid-November before picking up the mileage. Too many people of said I HAVE to do the 1/2 Marathon, so I am going to try to go for it. But with 3 weeks off from running, I decided to start with 4.25 miles (the .25 is just to get my annual mileage to an even number of 184) since all my runs will be full miles. I am going to TRY to get to 300 for the year but that will be a stretch - In order to do that I have to hit all my long runs (a couple of which will have to be done during the week do to weekend activities I have planned)

Thankfully the rain that plagued friends running the MCM in DC and that later plagued us did not hit during my run, which meant that I could run without my visor (which I will continue to need to run with since I will need it for my 1/2 in Disney). It was so freeing to run without a visor, sun glasses, nutrition or water. And it was a beautiful morning, around 44 degrees.

I ran 2.5 miles out (which is the distance from my start to a pond). Took a quick break to look at the leaves around the pond, and then ran 1.75 miles back and walked the rest of the way. I could have run the whole 2.5 miles back but 1) then my annual mileage would still not be a whole number and 2) why risk injury when I haven't run in 3 weeks? As it was my back was killing me the rest of the day, a part of me that usually doesn't hurt.

So here is my plan to get to the starting line on Saturday January 11th.
*Run every weekend, increasing the mileage by 1 mile, starting with 5 miles on 11/2 and reaching 13.1. I will need to adjust twice: 1 weekend I am going to New York for the day on Saturday and know I will walk a ton that day so I won't want to run on Sunday so I will run on Friday.
*Thanksgiving weekend I won't want to do a long run (I will be full on Friday, day trip on Saturday, will want to rest on Sunday), so I will run on Wednesday. Thankfully both of these are fairly early on in the training so the mileage is doable.
*Run once during the week - 3 miles, do some strides/speed work
*2 days of strength training
*1 day of biking
*Drink my water
*Only have extra sugar as a reward on my long run days (so in this case, I will be having NO candy on Halloween, but saving 5 pieces for Saturday) - And no, just because I am running 5 miles on Saturday doesn't mean I will get candy every long run!
*Get in steps during the week to keep my body moving

Notice that I said "get to the starting line" - I am a little nervous about the finish line mainly because of the time. You have to run 16 minute miles in order not to get swept. I run between 13:30 and 14:30 these days for the long runs so that doesn't leave a lot of extra time to enjoy the scenery, so I am going to try to run a little faster in my mid-week run to remind myself of what running faster feels like.

So there is the plan! Later this week I will be writing about a change at work that could help or hinder all of these plans!