"The Marathon is a Harsh Mistress"

Marathon? Not me! I did one when I was 26 and that's enough for me. But I liked the quote. Maybe it's a famous one, I don't know, but I heard Tom C. say it at my Wednesday night track workout as part of his pre-workout announcements. Tom, the coach, always mentions recent races and placings by the people who attend this workout. Many of the runners (and triathletes) in this group ("Club Northwest") are good. Like REALLY good. Elites, local and national champions, record holders in their age groups at the world level, Olympic contenders and all. And I get to workout alongside them. Well actually, "alongside" isn't true - they lap me constantly (I am usually the slowest by a long shot). The great thing is, as they are passing, they say "good job", "way to go", "keep it up". They're fast AND they're nice.

Anyway, apparently several runners from Club NW went to the Chicago Marathon last weekend with the high heat and humidity that made the news, stopped the race sent many to the hospital. Tom opened with the "Marathon is a Harsh Mistress" line and proceeded to tell us about the extreme conditions and how his runners did or didn't do, as there were many DNF's (that's "did not finish" to those of you new to racing acronyms).

Since I'm on the subject of the Wednesday night workouts, I'll tell you that I've been going almost weekly for a couple months and have some of the hardest run workouts I ever do. I know I go a bit too hard for these just being workouts (you're not supposed to be setting PR's in workouts), but that's the way it goes when you workout with others. I've been neglecting my long, easier paced runs lately and have got to get started on that if I hope to do the Seattle Half Marathon in late November. Longer, easier paced runs for me this time of year should be starting around 8 or 9 miles and working up to 12 to 13, and running 1:10 working up to 2 hours out. OK, next week it is then!