First Long Run

I did my first long run yesterday morning.  18 miles.  My previous Long run was 14 miles on 6/22.  Before that my longest runs were 1/2 marathons in races.   I have to go back to before I got injured, on Jan 18th I did a 17 miles.  That was a high volume week with 51 miles running.

The weather was great, actually a little cool after Monday's sweat-fest.  I worse a long sleeve to avoid "de-acclimating" to the heat.  I ran a nice steady high zone 1 pace around 7:30 average.  It's a hilly route, so it's hard to gauge actual pace, since its' rarely a flat road and GPS drifts a bit due to the bluff nearby and utility poles along the road.

Only issues were some bad shin splints on my left leg (my poor left leg).  but oddly, I never had any Achilles issues or PF symptoms.  It became fairly painful (like a cramp) by mile 16, but i just pushed on through and added it to my mental training.  Tried to keep form and not favor that leg.  Otherwise i felt pretty good.   I may run just slightly faster on my next run.   I consider the pace to be at my middle range for my IM run.  But I think I might have a 3:10 in my if I target the bottom end of zone 2 and try and go under 9:30 overall.  With a "death march" at a 3:30 to get me the final AQ slot in about a 9:45 time.

I did show that I can drink a full 20oz per hour and not feeling at all bloated running.  So that's just about 3oz per aide station.   So really just a quick shot of Perform or coke and water, and then maybe a gel every 6 miles (45 minutes).  Sounds like a fairly workable plan for moderate temperatures.  If i start feeling bloated at all, then skip the water at that station and re-evaluate.

Here's my run.

http://www.trainingpeaks.com/av/NADTBQVELZQY6XCKSBM2N2GUGU

I'm thinking I'll do 2 more very long runs of 20-21miles to get just over 2-1/2 hours.  After that I'll be up to Steelhead, and then taper.  Probably around the 21st or 22nd, then maybe 10 days later on the, on the 31st or 1st.... with plenty of time to recover before Steelhead.  While only a "B" race, I don't want dead legs going in.

Those same weeks I'll put in a 5 hour ride each week.  Maybe a 5-1/2 hour ride on one of those.

So really, despite just over 9 weeks left to train, there's not a whole lot of weeks left to build fitness before a lot taper.

Getting closer!