2013's efforts were fostered by great spring weather and a group of friends running the Mini also, so training was a breeze. My longest training run was a ten-miler a week before. Ready I was, with a result of 1:55:42. a strong effort for my first half marathon, so I hear.
2014 was a different experience. I planned to run this one mainly so I wasn't a one-and-done participant. Winter held on into spring, training runs outside were sparse, and I can't stand to run on a dread-mill for more than a few miles, if at all. My longest training run was the Talk Walk Run 10k on the previous weekend. This year's mini effort yielded a 2:01:06. Still solid, but had I recognized I was so close to the two hour mark, I could have stepped up the pace a bit.
It had been mentioned by NF that the Purdue Half Marathon was a bit more of a challenge, since the cities of Lafayette and West Lafayette are not so flat as the course through Indy for the OneAmerica 500 Festival Mini Marathon (shameless plug.) Having pressured my friend JL to enter as well, since he happens to be a Purdue grad and a super trainer, it was on. October was but a few (5) short months away. Get on a training plan.
Training, schmaining. My longest run in the 5 months preparing for this October 18 event was a solo 6 mile run around downtown Indy's Canal and Cultural Trail. Ha! Suck it Purdue Half!
It was really cold and my knees were weak from a summer of 3 volleyball games a week. Shut it. Don't judge my outfit.
By the way, the shirt is badass. Check out http://berelentlessapparel.com/ to get yours, or other great stuff.
Yeah, finished that s#!t in 1:56:56, including all of the hills. Turns out the NF/JL method of training-by-not-running isn't too bad after all.
