Three weeks of NYC Marathon training in one post!
Getting caught up after not writing here since September!
Tomorrow is the TCS NYC Marathon. My initial goal when starting this Substack in July was to write every day about my training. But life got in the way, especially work stuff. I now have my main job in advertising to do, as well as a retail merchandising side hustle, a quality assurance freelance job, and a research gig. Plus, I’m temporarily helping my brother with a data entry project for a non-profit he’s involved with. So that works out to five jobs! No wonder I haven’t had time to write here since last September!
The good news is, despite all of this work, I have been continuing my marathon training. It hasn’t been a perfect training cycle by any means. But I did three 20+ mile runs in the last six weeks. I also found two comfortable pairs of running shoes that I really like: the New Balance FuelCell SuperComp Pacer for shorter distances, and the New Balance FuelCell SuperComp Trainer for the marathon. Thanks to the New Balance store at the New York Road Runners RunCenter and the folks at New York Running Company in Columbus Circle for the recommendations! Hopefully, my foot pain at longer distances, which has been a problem over the past year, will not bother me with these shoes.
Here’s a look at a breakdown of Weeks 12, 13, and 14 of my NYC Marathon training:
NYC Marathon Training Week 12:
Day 1: An IronStrength class on The Intrepid. Since rain was in the forecast, we got to do the class inside the ship for the first time. Very cool!
Day 2: 2.82 mile run in Week 2 of my NYRR Turnover Tuesday class.
Day 3: Rest day.
Day 4: 2.58 mile run in Week 2 of my NYRR Running Fundamentals class. We did the run-walk method for the class, and I felt pretty good about it!
Day 5: 2.47 mile run in Clove Lakes Park.
Day 6: 20-minute Peloton ride. I was supposed to be doing the Newport half-marathon in Hoboken this morning, but my NYRR training coaches said that this was a bad idea, with another half-marathon coming up and the NYRR 18-mile training run also on the schedule. So I took it easy instead.
Day 7: 21 mile long run. This was my longest run of this marathon training schedule so far, but other than that, it was pretty uneventful.
NYC Marathon Training Week 13:
Day 1: .95 mile run from home to the bus. I then did strength training at the gym.
Day 2 and Day 3: “Rest days” — which really meant doing my side hustles.
Day 4: 3.88 miles for the Damon Runyon 5K at Yankee Stadium after work, and then jogging to the suite. I did the race with my friend Michael Ring. He is a longtime marathoner who contracted Guillain-Barre Syndrome a few years ago and had to use a wheelchair for a while. Since then, he is running again and has completed multiple marathons. It was an honor to go around the ballpark with him!
Day 5: Virtual 5K for Gourdy’s Pumpkin Run. This was the September to Remember virtual race, and I earned a really nice medal for it. I have virtual races to do for October and November for this, as well as the Tough Pumpkin 5K (I run the distance while holding a pumpkin!
Day 6: 5.17 mile run and a 10-minute and a 30-minute Peloton ride. I ran to get to Richmondtown on Staten Island to do the first annual St. Andrew’s Church Steeplechase 5K. Mario, my old coach, put on the race and did a great job with everything. It was a cool race. That evening, I did two Peloton rides at home.
Day 7: 1.85 mile run. This was not my day! I was supposed to be doing the NYRR 18-mile Marathon Training Run this Sunday morning, but it was cancelled due to rain and winds in the forecast. So I had to run on my own. I got a very late start on my long run, and the weather was terrible. So I cut the run extremely short and decided to do my long run the following day.
NYC Marathon Training Week 14
Day 1: 13.97 miles. I finally did my long run, albeit on a Monday, not a Sunday. I did the Newport Half Marathon virtually (the in-person race I bailed on a few weeks back) and NYCRUNS was nice enough to mail me my shirt and medal. Then I ran a little more and got up to nearly 14 miles.
Day 2: 4.2 miles in Turnover Tuesday and a cooldown afterwards. I seem to be getting a little faster in this class!
Day 3: Rest day.
Day 4: 2.35 miles in Running Fundamentals.
Day 5: 20-minute Peloton ride.
Day 6: Rest day.
Day 7: 13.22 miles in the NYRR Staten Island Half. It was the first SI Half put on since 2019, and it was a great day, with perfect weather. It is one of the two NYRR races each year where I have home-field advantage to get there easily. (The NYC Marathon is the other one!) I had a really great race and finished in 2:53:44. That was 13:16 a mile, and it was 40 seconds a mile faster than the Bronx 10-Miler three weeks before. This was my strongest race since April’s NYRR Shape Women’s Half. I felt pretty confident after this race that I would be doing well in the marathon.