The final week....

It's the final week before my half-marathon and I can tell the reduced mileage of the tapering is having an effect on me. I'm starting to feel as if I have extra energy to burn.

For example, on my long run on Sunday, I had a "meager" 5 miles to run per my training schedule. By the time I hit mile 4, I had guestimated that if I kept my current pace, I would hit a non-competitive PR for a 10K distance if I went an extra 1.2 miles. I'm just way too competitive...I think anyone who knows me can attest to that. So what the heck...an extra 1.2 miles is not going to put me at risk for injury.

So yes, I did ignore my training program by technically over-training, but it was 1.2 miles...what could be the harm? Well, thankfully, there was no harm, but that doesn't mean the next time I could turn an ankle or take a bad step during that extra 1.2 mile trek...and then what...no one to blame but myself.

Oh yeah...I *did* have set a non-competitive 10K PR with a 1:01:56, but that's the last time I'm doing anything outside of my training schedule like that....really, I swear. :)

Seriously though, I've been on this training program for 3+ months now and there is actually too much to risk by being impatient and not keeping my energy level in check, so with a week to go and 3 training runs left, I'm going to keep things low key.

There's only a 3-miler, 4-miler, and a 2-miler before the big day...I have a feeling they're all going to feel like nothing. The only run that I might push beyond the scheduled mileage is the 3-miler. What's an extra 0.1 miles to get it past the 5K mark? It's not like I ran an extra 1.2 miles like I did on Sunday. With the 4-miler, there's no point in stretching it out to 5 miles...I'm fine with 4 miles. And 2 miles is just a short jaunt around my neighbourhood.

Another thing I found out is that the weather forecast for Sunday is going to be warm...like it ought to be 8 degrees Celsius for race morning, which is a bit warmer than I expected. It's warmer than my "tights-wearing threshold" of 5 Celsius and it's supposed to warm up significantly. We'll see what happens as the big day gets closer as I'll have to update my running wardrobe accordingly.