Tapering before Surf City Marathon

Since my last longest run before the Surf City Marathon last Monday, I’ve been taking it easy, running only up to 9 miles for long runs this week. Actually, I planned to run another 17 miler yesterday (Sunday) but ended up running only just under 9 miles. I had gone to the gym the day before and because it had been close to a week since last time I went in, my upper body was quite sore. I could tell my body didn’t recover from it at all.

Now, the race is about 6 days left, and I feel a bit anxious.

Part of me wants to get this over with as soon as possible.

Another part of me asks myself if I am really ready. I have worked on this goal since last August, and now that the race is almost here, I wonder if I am really ready.

If you have been following my journey, you know that I was training for the Long Beach Marathon last year and that the plantar fasciitis injury forced me to sit out of the race. And you also know that how disappointed I was while limping through the convention center where I picked up my bib then. And then as soon as I recovered from it, I got back on the training for this year’s Surf City race.

But was it a smart move to sign up for the Surf City because I was so disappointed and that I wanted to make up so badly for the ill-fated chance? Will I be able to have my dream come true this Sunday? Am I going to be able to qualify for the 2016 Boston Marathon?

This will be a race where I can truly put myself and all the training that I put in for the last 4 1/2 months, excluding the whole month of not being able to train due to the injury, to the test.

I’ll head down to Huntington Beach this Saturday to pick up my bib and then settle in at a motel for the night. I will get up early next day and be at the start line a couple of hours before the start time, which is 6:30 am.

This last training week is an easy week. 2nd tapering week. About 3 miles tomorrow, 6 miles the day after and 2 miles or so on Friday. We all know the drill.

The next post will be about the result. Good or bad.

Wish me luck.

Thanks for reading.