And training officially begins!

July 1st is here!  My training for the 2013 ING marathon has officially begun!  So here I am, a year later and going for it the second time around.  I ran this weekend, just a quick two miler.  I woke up late and didn't get started until around 8am.  The humidity was really just stifling.  Two miles was all I had in me yesterday morning.  I also did a ton of activity this weekend in general.  My weekend was another glorious one!  Hours of walking and bike riding, two movies and chilling with my two buds Brendan and Clyde!  Clyde really was not interested in the walking part, so after a few attempts at longer walks I took him home and let him relax in the A/C.  Each year he gets worse and worse in the heat.

This morning I was up early in an attempt to beat the humidity, around 5:45am.  I ran, it was ok, but not amazing.  I'm sorry but the first day of training and having it be as humid as it was stunk.  I was all ready to be positive and happy about marathon training, but in the end I did it, about a 9:30 minute mile pace and it was just ok.  I went home, stretched and got to work early.  I ran 4.5 miles this am.  A little longer than what I started out with last year, but I want to pusth myself a little harder than last year.  My goal is to be stronger and more prepared.  Don't get me wrong, I could have run the marathon last year.  I was up to 22 miles and I know I would have run it, but I did hit some hiccups during training.  Mostly towards the end since I was so tired of it all.  I hope to remain focused and strength train a lot more. 

My post run "glow"

I gave myself a pedicure yesterday too, which felt great and my toes look like a pro got to them, however my soft feet gave me a big ole blister this am.  Last year my feet suffered the most, including losing two toe nails!  I am going to put some money into investing the proper socks and preventative bandages to not have them go completely to shit this year.

I have runs scheduled for Wed/Thurs & Sat this week.  Saturday being my long one, with a distance of 6 miles.  I do plan on weight training tomorrow and Sunday.  Let this be my ceremonial "ribbon cutting", and I'm off!