Myrtle Beach Marathon Preview

 I am looking forward to going for a pr and a BQ this weekend. I made the decision to return here shortly after failing to get the BQ last year at Tobacco Road but I had one more chance in October at the Wineglass Marathon. Injury caused another failure there so it was on for MB. The problem was I needed to begin the training  but first I had to get over the injuries that had been cramping my running plans since August. I still had a couple of events to complete, most importantly the 50 miler at Tussey Mountainback to get the Western States qualifier. Miraculously the legs held up and it seemed that the injury actually began to improve at the 40 mile mark of that race and continued to get better over the next month.

  I was still having some issues and although I could still run I could not do anything at a fast pace. I was afraid if I could just get  through Derby 50k in November without further aggravating things that I was going to  have to take off the month of December to let it heal and if so there would be no chance for a fast time here at MB.  Well, I am very happy to say that I ran Derby practically pain free, recovered quickly and within a week I was back to my normal training volume of about 50 miles per week. I tested the legs out with some tempo pace runs and had no problems so I have been able to get in some good quality training despite having to do so many in some truly atrocious weather.

  I haven't even attempted to follow any particular training schedule but in a lot of cases just made up the workouts as I was starting off depending how I felt that day. Plenty of miles at tempo pace and marathon goal pace. I was able to do this while building my mileage in January up to 60 mile per week before finally doing a two week taper.

  The main reasons for choosing MB is the fact that  it is  a very fast course and usually the weather is going to be in a range conducive to running well. Looks like we get lucky with that this year with lows in the upper 30's and high in the low 50's and sunny !

 This will be my 6th time running the full marathon here. The first time I came and paced Karla in her first. I returned the next year and ran my pr at age 50 and qualified for Boston so I could run Boston with her. The next 3 years I just ran it with her for fun. I hope this year will be fun but its all about going FAST !

 Here is the race website:  

 If anyone cares to follow along there are apps available for iphone or android. Just search for the MB marathon app.