MTP Week 1 Overview...

For those of you who aren't used to my seemingly constant abbreviations yet (blame it on the day job...teachers are constantly shortening words to save themselves writing time/hand cramps), MTP stands for Marathon Training Program.  Well yesterday marked the end of my first week of training for the Tacoma City Marathon...

...and it was definitely a little harder than I thought it was going to be.  Before the MTP, I was averaging, at most, about 10 miles per week.  The first week out, we did a total of 24 miles over the course of four separate runs.  The increase in total mileage was pretty rough on me, especially since, for some unknown reason, I unwittingly chose fairly hilly courses for my 6 mile run on Wednesday and my 7 mile run on Thursday.  Thankfully, those two runs made my relatively flat 8 mile run on Saturday seem like a breeze...ok, 8 miles was nowhere near a breeze, but at least it didn't kill me! So here's the breakdown of my first week of torture...I mean training:

Monday: Ran 3 miles in 27:21 along Ruston Way...relatively flat, but I still got tired toward the end.

Tuesday: Stretching/rest...very sore!!!

Wednesday: Ran 6 miles in 59:39...actually had to split the run into two parts: I ran the first 4.6 miles in 46:12 near my school along a couple of our cross country runs (the Telephone and Bridge Runs combined) and had to stop because there were too many hills, so I drove home to give myself a little rest, and ran the remaining 1.4 miles in 13.27 around my neighborhood.

Thursday: Ran 7 miles in 1:14:02 on the Nyanza/Telephone/Bridge Runs combined...had to walk up a couple of the bigger hills because my legs felt like jello from the day before, but I ran the entire mileage together, so I was prouder of myself than I had been the day before.

Friday: Stretching/rest...stretching hurt a lot, so I pretty much just rested...so sue me!

Saturday: Ran 8 miles in 1:21:04 with the entire training group out on the Orting City Park Trail...I only stopped at the designated refueling stations to get water/gatorade, but otherwise I ran the entire time.  Interestingly enough, my best splits (and also the miles where I felt the best) were on miles 6 and 7...found that kind of funny.

Sunday: Stretching/rest...stretching felt great today, and I wasn't as sore as I thought I'd be.

The one thing I did learn the hard way on my run on Saturday is that my running shoes are a bit too small and I need to get new ones desperately as I now have 3 huge blisters and one toenail that is threatening to fall off. (Sorry if I grossed anyone out there!)  Even with that, I'm still pretty excited about the MTP and am excited to see how I feel after my runs this second week.  My schedule for Week 2 is as follows:

Monday: 3 mile head lamp group run
Tuesday: 7 mile run
Wednesday: Stretching/rest
Thursday: 8 mile run
Friday: Stretching/rest
Saturday: 9 mile morning group run
Sunday: Stretching/rest

Thanks for keeping me honest guys...hope you are enjoying my escapades in running!

I'd like to get some variety in my weekly runs, so...do you know of any good running routes in the Tacoma area that aren't completely flat, but also don't have hills so huge that I keel over dead trying to run up them?