My first marathon

In the disappointing hours, and days, that followed my DNF in Racine, I needed something. A new goal. A reason to keep training. A way to make sure all the Ironman workouts weren't "wasted."

So, I moved by Priority A2 race goal for the year, a marathon, from sometime in November or December, to six weeks away. I signed up for the trail marathon at Lapham Peak State Park on Sept. 7.

I'd been out there hiking on some of the trails recently, and when I googled "marathon, Wisconsin," the Lapham race popped up and I signed up. It'll be four laps on the hardest trail, with a diversion on lap 1 that climbs the tower and back down.

Since I'd been thinking seriously about doing the Death Valley marathon in December as my first, choosing a trail run 26.2 doesn't feel that odd.

Last week, I did my first walk of the whole trail to get an idea of all the terrain for the run. There are many rolling hills, and a few very steep climbs on the course. (It's a good thing I didn't walk the whole trail before signing up though, or I might not have done so.)

So now my next six weeks will include longer and longer runs, and some biking and swimming. I'm trying to do at least 4-5 mile runs a couple times during the week, and have long-distance runs just about each weekend when I can leading up to the race.

LD run this past weekend was 11.25 miles, in a bit over two hours. Sometime next weekend I need to work in 14-15 miles.