Third Time's The Charm!

Sunday was a great day for a long run, even with the sun blaring down on us. I decided Charlie and I would run the Hope Runs Here Half course and then add a bit more to hit my 14 mile mark. We parked at my niece's house, which is on the course, and headed out to William Floyd Parkway from there. Thankfully my Garmin found a satellite rather quickly and our warm-up walk was included in our total distance.

 At 7:45 am we got going, starting at about the bottom left of that rectangle, under mile marker 4. We then went up that block and headed south towards the beach and over the bridge. The ocean breezes were absolutely mahvelous and exactly the opposite of what the conditions were on that half day! I just ran as far as I could and then would walk a bit. I wasn't using my Gymboss with the 2:1 interval. Charlie said he thinks I am running further without it since all I seem to do is anticipate the beeps of the timer to start and stop. It made the run more enjoyable without all that noise!



The incline of the bridge seemed like nothing compared to the hills we've been running on in Selden. We were able to run up it both going into and out of the beach. We ran passed the TWA Flight 800 International Memorial and out along the perimeter of the parking lot. We continued out, back over the bridge, up WFP and made our left, heading back past the car (I should have stocked it with cold drinks!!), along Grandview and the beautiful Great South Bay. Once we were back on the highway we made another left turn into the neighborhood just south of mine.

Unfortunately, the street we turned onto borders the Wertheim Wildlife Refuge and the biting bugs were out in full force, just like the first time we attempted a 14 miler! We got away from that area as quickly as we could and headed into the Smith Point Estates, where the streets are nice and wide and lined with gorgeous homes to ooh and aah over. The best part about a nice neighborhood like that? SPRINKLER SYSTEMS!!! We ran through them as often as possible.

I had an idea of what our mileage was from knowing the course, so I did not look at my watch AT ALL. It was hard for me, but I wanted to be far enough along on the run to know I *would* get it done. We wound up burning through our beverages pretty quickly so we decided to make a pit stop at Dunkin Donuts and get that really refreshing unsweetened iced tea lemonade. We were only about a mile from the house at this point, and my plan was to run up to the house for more fluids, but I know me. It might have taken too much effort to leave the front door again. We filled up our bottles and I dumped some ice in my sports bra. HIGHLY SUGGESTED! And my watch was at nearly 8 miles at that point, in under 1:50, with the stop.

So back on the road, heading south on WFP and we decided to veer off the half course and start zig zagging up and down the blocks in order to rack up the miles. I slowed down some. The next 4 miles were done in a bit over an hour. My goal was to get the 14 miles done in the same time it took us to do the half marathon, which was 3:25:17. We hit mile 12 at 2:57 and my left calf started cramping, we were out of fluids, again, and it was now almost 11 am, full sun in effect. So we stopped at 7-11 and I got a Vitamin Water and we walked the last two miles, slowly. We got to the car at about mile 13 and just kept walking up and down the block, passing it four times.

Finish time of 3:39:03, but with the two pit stops we had a moving time of 3:35:36.

I need to work on both my endurance for the runs and my walking speed to hold a 15:00 mile and under for the TCS NYC Marathon 18 Tune-Up run on September 20th, which has a 4:30 course limit. It will hopefully be cooler but because it's in Central Park, it will be 3 hilly 6 mile loops. I am concerned but we'll be back to the hills course on Sunday for more hill training. I am going to attempt to get there once a week until that race and at least every other week until the marathon.

For now I am celebrating the fact that I made it through that mental blockade of going past the half marathon distance. I may possibly have more road blocks on future runs, but I need to remind myself of how far I have come since my knee injury and who I am doing this for- both myself and the EJ Autism Foundation.