Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Visions of a Marathon

I want to run one and I'm going to run one. I hate uncertainty and it's probably silly to pressure myself into choosing a goal marathon in May, but well, that's just me.

We've already paid for our trip to Vegas to run the Rock n Roll half marathon there on 12/4/11, so that rules out the obvious choice of White Rock in Dallas on 12/4.

My other criteria is that I want it to be in Texas becase
1- I don't want to have to travel too far before or after.
2- I'd like as much friend/family support as possible, even if that's just my mom (who has already said she must be there) and Jake (who I'm hoping will run... nudge, nudge... but I know would be there no matter what).

My options as I see them are:
  1. Rock n Roll San Antonio (roughly 5.5 hour drive)- November 13, 2011
  2. Houston (which is a lottery and roughly 4.5 hour drive)- January 15, 2012
  3. Galveston (roughly 5.5 hour drive)- February 5, 2012
On second thought, it's not silly to be thinking now. If I choose San Antonio and go with Hal Higdon's 18 week plan I start training in a month!

Please give me your input (on which marathon, how to choose, training, anything you have)!

5 comments:

bobbi said...

If you are committed to running in Vegas on 12/4, I wouldn't recommend running your first marathon 3 weeks prior - you just can't know how your recovery will be...

But that's all I got. I stayed close to home for my first for the exact reasons you list here, and I was never sad about that.

Good luck!

Kristi said...

Thanks... That's a good point!

Pam @ herbieontherun.com said...

I definitely agree with Bobbi on her Vegas point. And let me throw this out there too... this is what I'm gonna do if I ever decide to run another one: Rather than picking a race and say I'm training for THAT one, I'm gonna train myself up to a 20ish mile long run and THEN look around for races coming up soon. Last time, I picked a race way out in advance and then 16 weeks prior started with a 16-week training program only to end up injured about halfway through. (IT band and prepatellar bursitis). Since I had already paid the race entry fee and bought plane tickets, I couldn't back out. Nor did I have the time to take off and heal properly. It made the rest of my training and the race miserably painful. I will never put myself in that situation again.

Kristi said...

Pam- thanks. Also a good point. That kinda makes me want to enter the lottery for Houston. Even if I get in and don't end up running due to injury it would just be an entry fee lost. But that would leave a couple more months before it gets hot in Texas to run a different marathon.

Anonymous said...

There's also Big D in April! ;-) (Just found your blog after you commented on mine...)