Hello friends — I have some exciting news! I’ve officially signed up for my 3rd half marathon! And guess what? It’s in VEGAS 🙂
I’m really excited for a few reasons:
1) Duh — it’s in Vegas. I’ve never been to Vegas! I’m not sure if I’ll love or hate it. We’ll find out 😉
2) It’s a Rock ‘n Roll marathon series, which means there are fun bands all along the course to entertain you. I’ve always wanted to run an RnR event!
3) It’s a night race! The half marathon doesn’t start until 5:30 p.m. and takes us all along the famous Vegas strip — how cool is that? Although this could be kind of a disaster, given that I’m usually not the best evening runner due to stomach issues from eating all day. We’ll see 🙂
4) I’ll also be attending the Urban Running Summit — a running blogger conference — the day before the race! They built the conference around the fact that the big race was that weekend so all of us could come to the conference AND do the race together. Fun!
5) I’ll be attending the conference and running the race sponsored by Attune Foods — and so will my blogger buddy (and fellow Attune brand ambassador) Meghann! We’re both excited to have a partner in crime 🙂 Attune is making fun technical t-shirts with their logo on them for us to race in — cool! We’ll also be rooming together. I heart slumber parties.
Me and Meghann in Orlando in 2010
The only downside is that we arrive on Friday and the race isn’t until Sunday night, which kind of limits our options for painting Vegas red if we want to not feel like crap come Sunday night. Meghann and I have almost identical half marathon PR’s (personal records — hers is 1:51:52 and mine is 1:51:47), so it will be perfect to run together, but we’re not aiming to PR, given the fact that it’s a night race, we’re in Vegas, etc. I’m just looking at this race as fun and will hopefully do another one in the spring more seriously for time. 🙂 Maybe the DC National Half again… we’ll see!
That said, we would still like to come in under 2 hours!
Here’s my tentative training plan:
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Mondays: swim (~45 mins)
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Tuesdays: speed work at the track
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Wednesdays: power yoga (1 hour)
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Thursdays: 3 to 6 mile run, plus hills
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Fridays: rest
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Saturdays: kickboxing
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Sundays: long run
As you can see, I’m running only 3 days per week (and cross training 3); that’s what has worked for me in the past so I’m sticking with it. If I’m feeling exhausted, I’ll take extra days off. I’ll also be icing and foam rolling after EVERY run. I’m still debating if I want to do my long runs on Saturday or Sunday. Right now I said Sunday because I like going to kickboxing on Saturdays, but we’ll see. I may change my mind because I like biking/hiking on Sundays with Matt 🙂
My training will start in 2 weeks — here’s my long run schedule.
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Sept 18th — 6 miles
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Sept 24th — doing a 10k mud run, so that will count 🙂
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Oct 2nd — 7 miles
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Oct 9th — 8 miles
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Oct 16th — 7 miles
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Oct 22nd — 9 miles
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Oct 30th — 10 miles
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Nov 6th — 11 miles
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Nov 13th — 9 miles
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Nov 20th — 12 miles
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Nov 27th — 7 miles
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Dec 4th — Rock ‘n Roll Half Marathon!
I’m excited for this new challenge! It will be harder than training this spring was because I won’t have all my grad school girlfriends to train with (a bunch of them are injured, and they aren’t training for any races right now), but I know I can do this. Vegas or bust!
Want more details on my previous half marathons? Check out the recaps and related posts below!
Race Recaps:
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My 2nd half marathon: National Half Marathon (Washington, DC) — March 2011 (*PR: 1:51:47)
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My 1st half marathon: Zooma Half Marathon (Annapolis, MD) — June 2010 (torturous — I was so proud to finish!)
Training Plans:
Running Tips:
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How I overcame a knee injury (1st half marathon training reflections)
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How to use a foam roller (with video!)
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Have you ever been to Vegas? Love it or hate it?
Have you ever run in a night race? Any tips?
