So, I Signed Up To Run A Marathon

That’s right — Sunday night I signed up for the Charleston Marathon. Not the half marathon, mind you — the full 26.2 miler marathon.

Eek!!

I actually have been training for a few weeks now, but have been a teeny bit shy about announcing it on here just in case I chicken out and decide not to run it. But $65 of my pretty dollars have been committed towards this goal, so we can now make it official — I am training for a marathon!

The idea started when I was creating my 30 before 30 list. In a courageous moment I stuck “Run a Marathon” on the list and then published it. Afterwards I thought, What was I thinking putting that on there? That’s probably going to be the one thing I don’t complete on that list. But then I got my new job and a more structured schedule and thought — if I’m ever going to run a marathon, it’s going to be now.

I’m running it with two friends in January. We’re all in different cities, but keeping up with each other through daily emails of encouragement and recaps of our runs, both good and bad. We started training 25 weeks out, so here’s the schedule I’m using:

Here’s a link to the easier-to-read version.

It’s mighty scary looking at some of those 15+ runs, but I think with a little determination and time, I can do it. I’m currently in the middle of week 5, so I’ll be running 6 miles this weekend. I apologize in advance because I’m going to writing a lot about my training and weekly progress on here to keep me motivated and accountable. 4 weeks down, 21 weeks to go!

Have you run a marathon before? Any tips and tricks for surviving the long runs?