4 weeks remaining until Grandma's Marathon. I will throw two races in there before then - Brian Kraft 5k on Memorial Day around Lake Nokomis and Dam to Dam 20k in Des Moines on June 4. I feel like I am going old school with this one by racing a variety of distances close to marathon day. I almost feel like a lot of the current American marathoners might be a bit too cautious with the racing and putting too many eggs in the basket for the one special day. Although, it normally works for the Hanson's group, there have been an abundance of 2:14-2:15 performances coming out of Rochester Hills. Now I am not knocking these times, as I would be absolutely thrilled to add a 2:14 marathon PR to my resume, but perhaps a few more races in the lead up could help knock a minute or two off those averages. That's what I am banking on this time for myself. We will see how my hypothesis plays out in four weeks.

The USATF 25k footrace I ran last Saturday in Grand Rapids was a good evaluation of my current fitness heading into the last month of the Grandma's training cycle. I layed off the hot pace early and stuck to my game plan of running even splits. I accomplished this, but it kinda sucks remembering that I was watching the pack stay the same distance in front of me for half the race. It got tough running solo, however, as we turned into the wind and hit the hilly section of the beautiful course. If I was sharper and did not have the mindset that the race could be used more as marathon prep, I am hoping I could have been up there in the top 3. Possibly not though, so I will just take the result and use it as a confidence boost because I felt very strong. Averaging 5 min pace over 25k is so much more of a marathon predictor than any half marathon and so I took a lot of positive from the day.

Here is my training for this past week with a hard sesh on the Lake-Ford River Road loop looming this coming Tuesday:

Sat Race 25k 1:17.50 for 5th place, wu&cd
Sun Easy 1:20+ min with Julie on the bike giving fluids every 20 min. Felt ok considering the race was still in the legs
Mon AM 76 PM 58
Tues AM 1 hr with Lundo @ SLP LTF PM 45 min
Wed AM with Schen-del and Lehm 10 at the Lakes PM 25 min
Thurs AM 40 min PM Grass Track 24x35 sec wu&cd
Fri 1:15
Sat 24 miles in the pouring rain w/AC home-medicine lk-Theo Wirth last 1200 5 min pace or under
Sun 65 min