Hi Ho, Hi Ho.

It's off to Boston I go!

Flight in the morning, bag almost packed.
The last two weeks have been a bit of a disappointment in running terms. I had hoped to keep the mileage going at around 50 last week, but it didn't happen. I had a plan for a tempo and a long run, and ended up doing a hybrid of both.
So last Saturday was 9 days out from Marathon day, Gary's advice is to run your last hard run about 10 days out from the target race. So I did one mile warmup at 7:20, and then into a planned 10 mile at 6:55. The reason it was 6:55 was that I wanted to run about 20 seconds faster per mile than target.
I wasn't sure how the 10 miles would work out. It went quite well, the pace feeling quite easy, and banking a few seconds each mile unintentionally. At the 10 miles I stopped and clocked in at 6:49 average for the session, with almost 2 miles home that gave me just short of 13 miles.
Rest on Sunday and Monday, 5 miles easy at 7:35 Tuesday.
Wednesday I went to the track. After 1 mile warmup, I planned 3x1 mile at 6:40 with 1 minute recovery. The paces were 6:16, 6:29 and 6:27. They just felt so easy, I struggled to slow them down. I think it's a combination of two things. The taper is leaving me with fresh legs so they are strong, which is a good sign, and when I run on the track my brain thinks I should be running hard.

Today was a 1 mile warmup, 3 miles at planned 6:50, which ended at 6:42 average, and a 1 mile cool down, and that's it!

Weather forecast is 22 degrees Celsius for the marathon day, which does not bode well. The website already talks of the dangers of heat stroke, and recommends running slower than planned pace, which makes me wonder do they know their audience!

I will play it by ear on the day and assess the conditions. No pressure of a sub 3 attempt, it was never on the cards. I would like to finish this one at a consistent pace after the crash at Dublin, just to get my confidence back. If I can pull it back towards a 3:10 time I would be delighted, but once I beat my Dublin time then it's a win.