Happy Thursday! Hopefully I’ve made it to the Grand Canyon by now (I flew into Vegas yesterday and pre-wrote today & tomorrow’s posts so I could be 100% enjoying our trip) with my Mom & Grandmother. We spent the night in the Grand Canyon last night and are driving back to Las Vegas this afternoon. Expo for the race is TOMORROW! YAY! Let’s recap my 16-week training cycle shall we?

• I ran 627.89 miles this training cycle.

• I climbed 30, 764’ in elevation!

• I paced a 100-miler for 19.41 miles through the middle of the night on the trails here in Steamboat at the Run Rabbit Run

• I peaked at 46.68 miles in Week # 16

• I switched from the marathon to the half marathon after week #5, where I started feeling burnt-out from marathon training and wanted a new goal

• I started out running 3/4 mile repeats at my Half Marathon goal pace (7:42-7:47) on August 28th with splits of: 7:47/ 7:47/ 7:41/ 7:41/ 7:35/ 7:30. I completed my last speed workout with 1 mile at Half Marathon goal pace (7:34), 3 x 1 mile at 10K goal pace (7:22) splits were: 7:14, 7:17, 7:19, 2 x 1/2 mile at 5K goal pace (7:04) splits were: 6:55, 7:11

• I ran a Half Marathon PR during a workout and placed 3rd in my Age Group (first time ever doing this!!)

• I ran early in the mornings, in between teaching skating, after work, in the heat, in the rain, overnight.

While it wasn’t the perfect training cycle, I feel like I definitely gained some speed and am excited to test my fitness on Sunday! BRING. IT . ON.