21 in the books

Last week I had a mini epiphany and wondered if switching my inserts had something to do with the increased knee pain. For 1.5 years I ran in the 'berry' super feet, and this spring they switched me to orange because it cups my heel better. It may 'cup my heel better,' but the arch support feels wrong for my foot, which in turn, makes me run a bit different. This isn't anything major when it comes to half marathons, but obviously can be detrimental with longer runs. On a whim I switched back to berry for a few bootcamps last week and it was very minimal pain- wooooooooooooo!  So I decided to give it a whirl for the weekend. 

This Saturday I used my berry super feet and did go ahead with my 20 miler run to see how my knee would hold up and determine if Sept 15 was going to be the day I finally run a full marathon, or just another half.

I was supposed to run 11 miles (5.5 out and back) and then meet up with Ashley to do the back 9. At mile 5 I was feeling surprisingly great so I decided to do 6 out and back so I could get a full 12 in before meeting up with Ash. 

Despite it being early, it was already getting swampy out, so it was actually nice to run alongside the train and get the cool breeze coming off of it as it passed by. 

I realized that I am quite frankly terrible at math. I originally told Ash to meet me around 7, which turned into 7:05-7:10 and finally my last text said 7:15ish.... I actually didn't get to the point I was supposed to meet her until a little after 7:30. Being the good friend she was she had started to get worried and walked a bit into the trail to find me, but then decided to wait a bit longer just in case I slowed down. 

Truth be told nothing bad happened, I just thought I was going faster than I was--- same story different tune with the heat, always feeling like I'm working entirely too hard for the times I'm running. First 12 miles done with a 9:02 avg pace. 

Last 9 with Ashley were comical- I am terrible at running and talking--- it seriously winds me. We had to take several stops to stretch and walk, poor Ash wasn't getting much of a workout in. Majority of our run was ran at a 9:30 pace and Ashley made the comment how it was very comfortable and now she 'gets' when people say they feel good when they run--- we both have a tendency to push ourselves too much during training runs so they tend to be miserable. 

Last few miles sucked- I was tired, we couldn't break a 10 min pace, and my stomach was growling at me to get some food--- I did see a cow though, and cows are my secret good luck charm, so stupid as it may seem, it did help 

 Last 3 miles the knee was bothering me, but not in that "holy cow I think my leg is going to fall off" kind of way... more so in the "why the hell are you running 21 miles Lisa" kind of way. I couldn't have mapped the distance any more perfectly as I finished RIGHT at my car for 21 miles---- so extremely happy to tackle that distance relatively pain free - Air Force Marathon here I come

21 miles with 9:30 average pace- finally got proof of my LONG run since last 20 miler I had to go based off someone else's watch.

Last night I did the Tin Roof run and Ash was nice enough to let me borrow her knee brace to see if it would potentially be worth getting for the marathon-----ZERO and I mean ZERO knee pain, it was magical. Needless to say I'm going to Dick's this week to get one and I'll be rocking it for my race... 3 weeks

Ash, Stu, me, B (4 out of the 6 of us for Van 1 Bourbon Chase)

This weekend I have a double header planned with Kim, Iowa on Sat, Nebraska on Sunday. If knee behaves well for this, I surely will be good to go 2 weeks after that!