And now, for the taper

The hard part is over...well...the long running is over. Tomorrow I begin my three week taper before the race.

Running went well this week. Around Tuesday it got really hot. So I ran early then and cut Wednesday's run short. On my rest day, Thursday, I got a surprise from my parents. They gave me my graduation present....a garmin Forerunner 305! I was very excited. I tested it out on a 5 miler on Friday and I love it.

Today, I had my last long run of 20 miles. It went much better than the last one. The course I ran on was a lot flatter, so that helped. I ran on a trail in the valley. I started at the McMillan (sp?) trailhead and ran the first leg to Orting by myself. There, my fiance joined me on her bike :) We rode/ran together for the next 14 miles. We stopped for some ShotBlocks and water/Powerade at miles 7, 11 and 14. On my previous long runs, I had used gummy bears. The ShotBlocks worked much better, I'll probably use them for the race.

I was hoping to run around 9:00 pace or 3 hours total. As you can see below, the first 5 miles made that seem unlikely. I'm not sure why or when, but I began to pick up my pace quite a bit. On the latter portion of the run, I was 'caught' by runners competing in the Rainier-to-Ruston race. A 50mile relay from Mt. Rainier to the Tacoma waterfront. It was fun watching them compete. As a bonus, all the people supporting them cheered for me too, thinking I was in the race! In all, I averaged 8:56 per mile (according to my Forerunner :) ). Three weeks until race day!

20-miler stats:
Total: 2:58:35/8:56 pace

Splits:
9:03, 9:12, 9:24, 9:20, 9:03, 8:50, 8:36, 9:01, 9:04, 8:47, 8:42, 8:39, 8:43, 9:10, 8:55, 8:46, 8:54, 8:45, 8:50, 8:44