My first long run of the summer season
Week 1, Day 6 of NYC Marathon Training: A 9-mile long run and some Peloton cycling
The long run is the most important run you do for marathon training. But when you are a back-of-the-pack runner like me, long runs can be an all-day affair — up to seven hours at once. Yikes!
In the fall, I am thrilled if I can get my long run finished in time to watch the second half of the 1 p.m. football games!
If you can’t successfully run for multiple hours (many in my case!) at once, you’re never going to get through the marathon.
Long runs don’t just train your body to survive a marathon. They train your brain and they help you to be able to survive the pain and the heat and the (at times!) boredom of running double-digit runs. (Not to mention fueling, which I will talk about in future columns.)
Saturday was my first long run of this marathon training season. Normally, I do short runs on Saturdays and my long runs on Sundays, but I am going to the Bastille Day festival on the Upper East Side on Sunday, so I decided to flip-flop my short and long run days this weekend.
I got in exactly nine very slow miles in the heat Saturday — the longest I have run since May’s Brooklyn Marathon. It took me 2:48:24 to finish, which isn’t great!
I would have liked to have gotten in another mile or two, but Saturday was my best friend Squawker Jon’s birthday, and we were going to an early meal at Hometown Barbecue in Industry City in Brooklyn. (Great barbecue there, by the way!)
So how do you keep yourself entertained when you are running multiple hours at once, without the fanfare of a race? For me, having fully charged headphones is crucial for long runs to keep yourself entertained. I alternate between music and talk, listening to podcasts and audiobooks for portions of the run, and music for other portions.
This Saturday, I listened to several episodes of Katie Fogarty’s A Certain Age podcast, which was terrific. I also checked out a few chapters from Rob Barnett’s audiobook, which was also excellent.
As for music, the Grateful Dead is probably my favorite band to listen to on long runs, especially concerts from 1972, their best year, IMHO.
Plus, a lot of their songs mention running: “We Can Run,” “Bertha,” and “Fire on the Mountain,” to name three examples. (“Going Down the Road Feeling Bad” doesn’t work for me, though! Who wants to think about feeling bad during a run?)
Grateful Dead stalwart Bob Weir (see pic below!) was very much into running back in the day, and I don’t think all of the band’s running song mentions are a coincidence.
And these lines from “Fire on the Mountain” are what go through my head every long run morning when it’s time to head out, but I’d rather sit at home with my coffee:
“Long distance runner, what you standin' there for?
Get up, get up, get out of the door.”
The struggle is real, y’all!
One other note: I did keep my Peloton cycling streak going Saturday evening, with a 15-minute Caribbean music ride. Fun!