January 2023 Monthly Running Challenge

Wow I forgot how chatty we can be, I missed 3 days and over 90 comments! I skimmed, congrats @martaindale!

I'm doing well, just plodding along. My watch only has me doing base runs atm. I assume its because I've done some shifts and a couple of nights on call so I'm a bit tired. I have increased the distance to 5k anyway and am enjoying doing a regular 5k again. 9 months after covid. Sigh. Now to slowly speed up.

Wonder if I can get to a 6min/k pace for a HM again before the end of June? I'm doubting it but you never know... I suspect this HM goal will be just to complete. Last year I was aiming for a sub 2hr HM.

So uplifting to see all the new people (and returning people) and read about the tremendous running accomplishments. Keep it going, everyone!!!!!

A joyful, if slow and short, run in the woods yesterday.

Love reading everyone's reports and all of the positivity in this group.

January total: 59.1/80 miles run
3.9/20 miles walk
63/100 miles total

1/1: 5 miles
1/2: 4.2 miles
1/5: 3.2 miles
1/6: 6.4 miles
1/7: 13.3 miles
1/8: 27 miles
1/11: 3.9 mile walk

I am back home now, and brought a cold with me. Luckily not covid - tested negative. Anyhoo, it’s taken me a bit to sit down and really process this last weekend.
The last day, fourth run, was the marathon. By the time you wake up at 2:15 am for 4 days in a row there just aren't any nerves left. I'm usually pretty nervous right before a race so it felt weird to be so calm. We had lovely early morning weather (low 50’s) and I finished before it got too warm. I was in corral B so there wasn’t a huge wait before our wave crossed the starting line. I stuck to the 1 mile run, 0.5 mile walk that I used while rehabbing my Achilles to make sure I didn’t push too much early on and cause it to flare up during the race. This worked really well though I'm pretty sure I post count at some point and skipped a walk break. I used my usual fueling plan of every 3.5 miles with a mixture of Maurten, gu, and Muir, walked the aid stations to make sure I got enough water.
The course is roadways punctuated by running through each of the 4 parks and around the Boardwalk area behind Epcot. This race felt different from others I've done here because 3 of the 4 parks were actually open as we were running through. There were so many more spectators and the park guests would cheer as we ran by. My training plan capped the long run at 16 miles so I had done that distance 3 times, but once I got above that, every mile was something new. I was really surprised by how good I felt on the back end. I never hit the dreaded wall. Mentally I felt strong and I never felt the doubts of whether I would be able to finish. Yes, the bottoms of my feet were stinging and my knees and hips complained a little. But, none of it was truly painful and I ran my fastest mile at mile 25. I definitely got emotional as I crossed the finish line and it hit me that not only had I run my first marathon, but I had also finished the Dopey challenge upright and with a smile on my face, which was my main goal. I also hopped off the course in Animal Kingdom and rode a roller coaster (Expedition Everest)! That is one of those things you could only do at a Disney run. This section of my strava map is the roller coaster ride! I’m glad I committed to training well for this challenge because I really got to enjoy it. It truly felt like a victory lap after months of long runs and little time off but I stand by my previous statement of one and done for the marathon and Dopey. The time commitment for marathon training is tough with a kid at home. If I were to consider doing another, it would at least be several years, after my kid graduates from high school. The race itself was fine. It wasn’t as physically or mentally hard as I thought it might be but the training took a toll. So for now, I’ll stick to the HM distance but I am going to up my base mileage. I ran a lot in 2022 and found that my body adapted well to the higher mileage. I felt totally fine after the HM and was only a little sore following the marathon. I could even walk stairs basically normally the next day. The higher weekly mileage is 100% to credit for that. An almost 50 mile race weekend was basically the same distance I had been running for the last 1-2 months. The story would probably be different if I had actually raced any of the distances, but since I kept things easy, the whole thing was so much fun!
I am taking this week completely off from running and will pick up some very short runs next week probably. I went out for a walk with my husband today just to get out of the house and move around. I can tell my legs are still tired, but the soreness is totally gone.
@quilteryoyo asked about times. The 5k was 37:54 (11:48/mi). 10k was 1:16:15 (11:58/mi). The HM was 2:28:32 (11:13/mi) and the marathon was 5:21:50 (11:55/mi). My overall place was 3227-3389 of about 16,000 runners, with about 12,700 finishers for the marathon. Not sure about the number of finishers for the other distances. I’m pretty proud about that.
And here is the medal collection!

January Goal: 100 Miles

1/1: 10.50 miles
1/3: 6.01 miles
1/4: 5.11 miles
1/5: 5.60 miles
1/8: 11.03 miles
1/10: 6.02 miles
1/11: 6.26 miles

50.53/100 miles completed for January

It was another lovely morning. 60°F when I got up. It dipped down to 57° as I ran, but was really nice. My hands did get kind of cold which I was surprised about. But overall it was good and I ran 6.25 miles.

@martaindale Fantastic race report. I'm so glad you had such a great time. The medal collection is awesome.