Marathon 7 week 1 training recap

My official training cycle for my 7th marathon kicked off this week. Not that all the training I've been doing for the last couple months wasn't so building up to this. The mileage was fine. I was a little over 17 miles for the week. This is much better than my kick off week last year so I will take this as a good first step. My weekday runs were decent enough. I cut my Thursday run short because I got out a little late and, knowing a 10 miler was my plan for Saturday, I didn't want to ramp up the mileage too fast. The 10 miler was miserable. I paced myself alright for the first half of the run. I've been doing kind of a run the first half of my long run distance and then walk / run as needed after that for the last couple of months. I figure staying on my feet and walking with an elevated heart rate beats limiting myself to what I can run with no breaks. I pushed this strategy to its bounds during my 10 miler. I pretty much walked the last 2.5 miles or so. I walk a ton during the marathon so I figure there is nothing saying I can't walk during the training too. I definitely need to carry water with me when I'm running for more than an hour or so. I also need to actually eat before heading out. One Pop-Tara isn't going to get the job done. I stopped at my gym and bought a Gatorade around mile 9. I needed something extra in my system to get me home. I tried running a bit after that but it was rough. Better to take it easy. This is only week 1 of the cycle. 

I did my non-running training as well. I rowed 5000 m Monday night. That was more challenging than it should have been. I went to the gym to lift twice (slow service at dinner Friday night kept me from meeting my 3 session goal) and did 15 minutes on the stairs today. I need to work the ab work back in. All in due time. 

This is a good start. Over 15 miles a week (it took me until late October to get over that mark last year) is the minimum I should be doing at this stage. Week 2 will be a bit of a departure from the normal workout schedule as I will be traveling towards the end of the week, but I built those plans into my workout schedule. I will get in 3 runs. The timing will just be a bit different.