Virtual tour has reached Boston!

16.4 more miles of long run were enough to bring me to Boston! But as the name of the blog implies, that is not enough. I now have to make it to the start in Hopkinton, which is, surprise, surprise, 26.2 more miles. This was also the last long run, because next Saturday will be only 12 miles. To celebrate, I speeded up the last 7 miles, and tried to take Panther Hollow with a good pace. It worked out pretty well: if I can do that in Boston I would be quite happy. Eventual pace: 7:55.

Weather was great: cool and sunny, but not too sunny (thin clouds). I can have this weather any time.

Nature in Frick

Like last Thursday, I ran in Frick Park, a welcome escape from the boring track. While I was down in the park, I suddenly ran past a deer, who was just watching be from the side of the trail. It was only meters away, and wasn't afraid at all! I ran the bottom loop a second time, but the deer was gone, and I saw a man with a dog just ahead of me...

Delayed hard work

I made another attempt at the intervals, and this time with good success. The weather was nice, not as windy as yesterday, cooler but sunny, and I had a good time chatting with Dan about last weekend's race (he ran the 30k, and ended in 6th place on a 6:40-ish pace, which is pretty amazing). The 600 meter intervals went pretty well, with paces 5:46/5:45/5:41/5:42/5:47. It seems the training is bearing fruits. As an encore Wayne challenged us for a last 300 meter, which I ran at a 5:04 pace. That is the pace the elites run the whole marathon. 

Lunch spoils the intervals

I wanted to run intervals today, because that was on the schedule, but due to some delayed telephone meeting my lunch was bobbing up and down in my stomach, effectively maximizing by speed. Also, there was a huge group of boys on the track that were quite in the way, so that wouldn't have been so good either. So, instead I resigned to just running a 6 miler. 

On a more positive note, some photo's were up from the race. Below my finish photo, and Steffi's.

End of peak training

With three weeks to go before the race, this day marks the end of peak training, and the start of the taper. To celebrate this, I did a last long run of 22 miles. Although only 20 miles were scheduled, I wanted to push it a bit further, inspired by the Runner's world forum fellow Boston runners, who all run long runs over 20 miles. 

I ran the last 20 mile before the Berlin marathon last fall way too fast, only 10 seconds above MP, and was exhausted from that for quite a while. But at that time I needed it to reassure myself that I could do it at that pace. With a bit more experience now, I decide to push the milage and test the waters in the "wall" part (the last 6.2 miles) of the race. I am happy to report that I did not feel the wall in today's run, and comfortably (well, let's say relatively comfortably) ran the last two miles. But I kept the pace easy at 8:25. I did have a nasty big hill at mile 18 though, so that will be good Newton hill simulation.