2 weeks until marathon #3

Yay!  I've received 6 donations for the Cystic Fibrosis (CF) charity that I will be running my marathon for!  I sent out an e-mail to most of my address book, posted on my Facebook page, and sent out a few tweets on Twitter soliciting donations.  My first donation came from Erika (my twitter friend that I've never met but we have running in common).  She told me that her nephew, Nathaniel, has CF.  He's 5 and a half years old and is such a cutie (pictured with Erika)!  When I first created a Twitter account, I had no idea how many amazing people I would meet!  The Burroughs family provided the second donation; Susan has CF and is the reason I'm running for this charity.  She founded the Reaching Out Foundation which provides financial assistance to familes who have a family member with CF.  My cousin Teresa was third to donate and is just proud to have an athletic relative.  My friend, Helen, who also is a friend of Susan, provided a generous donation.  And Amber, another dear friend who is the mother of my daugher's favorite baby-sitter, contributed as well.  My aunt forwarded my email to her friend, Pam, whose cousin has CF; she made a generous donation too. Thanks Aunt Cathy for forwarding my e-mail!  As of the end of this week, $135 has been contributed in my name to the John S. Pickering Foundation.

John Spencer Pinkering ("John John") was diagnosed with CF at age 2 and a half in 1995, and his parents were devastated. Once they became educated about CF, they knew that he could live a good life with the help of aggressive daily medical intervention, and we were determined to see him thrive. When he was four, they founded the John S. Pickering Foundation in his honor. Created out of their love for their son, and their dedication to the CF community, the foundation provides financial assistance to numerous CF causes. The primary goal of the John S. Pickering Foundation is to help provide quality of life to all CF patients while researchers are working to find a cure. They also support the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, whose only mission is to fund CF research.

If you'd like to make a donation, please click here to get to my donation page.  I will be running an inaugural marathon in Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina, on March 21, 2010, to support this worthy cause.

Now on to my week in running summary... I had a great run on Thursday, surprising myself of actually being able to achieve the pace that my running coach had prescribed!  I enjoyed running in the warm weather on Saturday as well.  I was supposed to run 19 miles on Sunday, but talked my coach into postponing that until Monday (it's a girl thing).  I managed to drop my yearly average pace, yet again!  I'm still behind on mileage/days run goals for 2010, but am pretty sure I'll catch up.  Read below for more info...

Monday:  Rest Day

Tuesday:  Ran 6 miles in 1:08:34, 11:26 minutes/mile average pace.  My legs are still very sore from Sunday's 17 mile run.  If I didn't have a coach to report too (or a marathon soon), I would have taken another rest day. But decided to be an athlete and Just do it!  I normally push miles 4 and 5, but did the minimum asked today since my legs are so sore.

Wednesday:  Was supposed to ride the stationary bike today, but worked late and had no desire to drive 30 minutes to the gym.

Thursday:  Ran 5 miles in 52:57, 10:35 minutes/mile average pace. Coach Josh originally prescribed the run to be at a 10:40 pace. Earlier in the week I complained that I doubted that was possible due to lingering leg soreness. So he changed my plan to sub-11:00 minutes per mile. This afternoon, my legs were feeling better and I decided to go for the 10:40 pace.  I was surprised that I was actually capable of doing it!

Friday:  Rest Day

Saturday:  Ran 3.05 miles in 35:08, 11:31 minutes/mile average pace (after jogging/walking 1.03 miles with Riley).  Coach Josh prescribed an easy 3 mile run. It was a gorgeous 60 degree, sunny afternoon!  I took the dogs to the vet this morning for vaccinations.  I didn't think much about it and decided to take Riley with me for my first mile. He slowed to a slow walk at less than a half-mile and I felt guilty; he did receive 3 shots a few hours ago (one in each of three legs). So I walked with him back home and then re-started my 3-mile run.  I was low on energy, but pushed my way through it.

Sunday:  Today was supposed to be a 19 mile run. But it's that-time-of-the-month and I just couldn't do it today. I'll do it tomorrow, instead.

Weekly summary:

• Days run this week:  3
• Miles run this week:  14.05
• Highlight of the week:  5 miles at 10:35 average pace
• Goal for next week:  do the 19 miles that I didn't do this week