After a rest week in my pre-marathon training (the past few weeks and next few weeks are building an endurance base for me to then enter marathon-specific training) I ran in the Ruston Peachfest 5K. Although the course was more hilly than what I train on in Monroe, I clocked my best time in a 5K to date: 30:33. Of course, I started off way too fast for me, running the first mile in 9:26. But I always get caught up in the crowd and find it hard to determine my own pace. The good news is that I wasn’t completely worn out after running a hard first mile. Endurance training is working. So I slowed down a little and ran mile 2 in 10:17. As I entered mile 3, I felt great, had energy in reserve, and really though I’d break 30 minutes in a 5K. Then we rounded the corner and saw “dead man’s hill,” a sharp incline next to a cemetery. Oof. Although I maintained a run up the hill, I was slowed quite a bit recovering at the top and knew then I wouldn’t break 30. Still had about 1/2 mile left at that point. My last 1.1 mile was in 10:49. This is all good news. For the first race in my short race history I had NO miles over 11 minutes. I had strength to finish the race at a nice pace, and was able to stay close to a consistent pace on each of the three miles.
Okay, now the Disney news. My wife just took a job as a teacher’s aide for next year (her first short step back into teaching after taking 8 years to have our two kids and stay home with them–and she loved every minute. Now they are in school all day and she wants to return to teaching–any school that has her will be blessed. She is a master teacher, winner of multiple teaching awards and a wonderful human being.) The Disney Marathon is on Jan. 13, which makes it hard with her and my work schedule and the kids school schedule to get there for the 2008 race. So I will definitely run in 2009. I will shift my goal, I am pretty sure, to the St Jude marathon in Memphis on Dec 1. This is disappointing conclusion, but I think having a marathon under my belt will make the Disney Race that much more fun.
This Running Life 