Week -16, Day 1

I'm back!
After a brief hiatus (okay, I was lazy and disappeared for a while), my marathon training blog is back with the official start of my 16-week training schedule! Although I know time will always be my limiting factor between work, grad school, home, and - of course - running, I'm going to try extra hard to maintain this during my training. I'm using Bob Glover's Competitive Runner's Handbook (love it!), so I'm also going to do my best to stick to the schedule. Visions of qualifying for Boston dangle in front of me, but I'm being realistic - I want to finish. Preferably in under 4 hours. Ideally without dying.

So.

Schedule for Monday, Week -16 = off.
How convenient! Although I'd love to continue my laziness that seemed to begin, oh, after I finished my half-marathon in May, I couldn't bring myself to do nothing on the first official day of my training. I also didn't want to go too hard and ruin the schedule.

Actual for Monday, Week -16 = 8 min. of abs in morning; 2.2 miles of running in 20:06 at dusk; ~4 miles of walking over lunchbreak and after dinner (speed too slow and insignificant to even estimate).
I'm going to have to get to bed earlier so that I'll be able to wake up earlier in the morning. The dusk run, even though it was a good hour or so after dinner, doesn't work for me anymore (although still very pretty). I'm just too full. I run along, feeling good at first, but eventually I feel heavy and on the verge of vomiting. Back to dawn runs for me! It is pretty invigorating getting a good run in before work; I just need to make sure I'm getting enough sleep on the back end. I had thought about it this morning but the early morning rain wasn't too inviting. No excuses now, though; it's going to have to be the morning, rain or shine. Or treadmill.
Abs worked well; I do think that doing more core exercises might help keep me in proper form when I get tired. I plan to incorporate weights again soon, particularly lunges. I hate them, but they work for me. I still hate them, though.

Coming up next = 3 miles.
I can handle that. Let's just hope I get enough sleep tonight so that I can drag my sorry bum out of bed at 5:45 tomorrow. My husband says that he might even go with me. I don't believe him. After getting up at 6:20 this morning as he slept through my alarm and watching the dog - yes, THE DOG - lift her head up and look at me, sigh, and curl back up in my spot on the bed, I think I might be on my own in the mornings.