Welcome to week 9 of our Marathon Training Blog series! Click here to read week 1!

Week 9:

Monday: REST!-Check.

Tuesday: 4 miles in 43m, 36s with an average of 10:54 min/mi. Gym. More Casefiles.

Wednesday: Crosstrain. Work was INSANE with lots of shopping, loading, unloading, moving, etc. Plus grocery shopping after work and squats and lunges when I had time. Crosstrain is definitely a hard thing to work in to our crazy schedule.

Thursday: 4 miles in 43m, 37s with an average of 10:55 min/mi. We ran outside. It’s staying dark so much longer these days as the summer dwindles down. We have a few running lights, but I’m starting to think we need some vests too.

Friday: CT or Rest. Rest.

Long Run Saturday–12 miles in 2:32:43 with an average of 12:44 min/mi. Mo joined us for 3 again and turned back for home. We snapped a quick selfie before we went our separate ways.

We are now officially half-marathon trained.

This was the 4th time we’ve had a 12 mile training day and every single time I’ve had a fantastic run and poor Brian has had a horrible run. We’ve self-diagnosed Brian with Hallux Limitus. Basically it’s pain in his big toe joint that’s not bad when he’s running, but the walking breaks seem to flare it up. He’s been for xrays to make sure it’s not something more serious and we’re going to try KT Tape and will possibly be looking into “Dance pads” and “perfect toe” spacers. He’s determined not to let this stop him. I hate to see him in pain.

On our 12-miler this week he was completely fine until mile 5. He began having slight pain, but nothing major. At mile 6 I felt energized and increased the speed a bit and he noticed, big time. We backed off. At mile 7, he got pretty quiet which meant the pain was bad. At mile 8 I tried some cheerleading and said “Look! It’s just like we’ve got to run one of our normal 4 miles we do on weekdays!  We got this!!!”  I think if looks could kill I would have been turned to stone right there. At mile 9 he was really dragging and I asked how much water he had drank and if he had eaten his last applesauce pouch. He hadn’t. That’s when I got a little bossy. I can get what Brian lovingly calls “Runners Turrets” I went on a mini sermon about how you can’t expect to perform well if you’re not fueling and no wonder he was feeling so rotten. He drank and ate and then backed off on his speed so I went ahead a bit (I can’t imagine why he wasn’t wanting to run next to me :)). When we were approaching the 10 mile mark, I turned and saw he was far behind me so I walked and waited for him. The pain was much worse and he was wiped out. I ended up finishing about 15 minutes before him and he had to completely walk the last .75 mile.

It’s his story to tell, but he’s very frustrated and realizing he’s got to search for solutions and went to the doctor this morning. Prayers appreciated that he can figure this out. He wants so badly to run and is an incredible runner. Th

Sunday: 3 mi EZ. Didn’t happen again. Shocker.

So, the final assessment of week 9:

95%, A.  Almost half way done!  Half Marathon trained… now to add on more miles. I feel strong. I feel healthy. I feel ready. Ask me again in a week or two :).

Week 10, here we come!.