Running

I'm a better runner than I was two years ago. I've run a lot more miles and I've been doing work-outs besides just running. I'm also a smarter runner.

When I was training for the marathon in 2012, my longest training run was 20 miles. My fastest mile was the first mile and the difference between the fastest and slowest mile was more than 3.5 minutes. (I tossed out one data point that would have made it even worse, but I was probably stuck at a cross walk.)

This year, I've completed one 20 mile run so far. On average, it was about 40 secs faster per mile than the similar run in 2012. What really strikes me (and this is where the smarter comes in), was that my pace varied only by 15 seconds from fastest to slowest. There were two exceptions, but they were the last two miles where I intentionally sped up to see what I had left in the tank.

So in 2012, I got slower as I went and was half-dead when I finished. This year, I maintained my speed until I decided to speed up and I could have run further.

I'm optimistic about my potential for a good result at the Knoxville Marathon in a few weeks.