Its really been an uneventful week except that I’ve tapered down the miles as I head into my final week before the next marathon. I wrote the other day about how humid it has been and it seems to have continued through the weekend. The humidity reminds me of how bad it was in Tampa Bay a few years back when I was there running in April, it was like you couldn’t even breath because the air was so dense with humidity.. thats how its been.

The good thing is its raining outside now, and some heavy thunderstorms are supposed to come through to break the humidity down a bit hopefully. The forecast for the next few days even shows a low of 47 degrees overnight Tuesday. We’ll have to see if that holds up or not, but if it does hold up, it will be a nice change from what I’ve been running in recently. Just to be safe, I decided to pick up a new fuel belt to wear for the marathon next weekend.. there is always a chance that it will be considerably warm again by next weekend since it is June. I’m not a fan of using a fuel belt because it usually chafes me up a little too much despite my attempts to lube up beforehand (at least the old model I had did). There are water stops every 2 miles in the race next week, but i’d rather have an extra 40oz on me due to the heat… I am one who sweats a lot, even in the shade.

I got the thought of a fuel belt from my semi-long trail run yesterday along the Lehigh Canal. The goal was to practice a cinder towpath course, break the monotony of running on roads and remind myself how hard running trails along the river is since the race next weekend is 75% cinder tow path along a river. The only bad part of the run was that I decided to not take any water with me, it only took me up to around 12 miles until I was parched, totally. Thankfully as I was heading back down through Sand Island park in Bethlehem along the trail, I found a water fountain in the play area which I took a detour to get to and stood at for about 2 minutes slurping water, it really hit the spot at the right time. I thought to myself how poorly I was running at that point due to being dehydrated, and I decided that I don’t just want to rely on water stops .. so I got the fuel belt.

So about that trail run … it was definitely a reminder of how deceivingly difficult running trails are just because they are perceived to be generally flat, but are they really? I say no (and my legs will agree). I’m glad I took the time to tune myself up to trails for the race, it was really a wake up call. My pace was decent, but I really felt beat up afterward, which I didn’t expect and I still can’t really explain.

After that run yesterday and a recovery run today, that leaves me with just 6 days now until the last spring marathon. I am looking forward to sleeping in a little bit and resting up this week. I’ve been going and going and going in so many ways, I know it because I haven’t been sleeping as good as I should be, so the extra sleep will help (although I’ll miss those early morning runs for now). The only struggle this week will be eating .. I’m craving carbs so bad right now, I have to keep it under control with the reduction of miles, but I think I can do it..

Well, another update later in the week as i continue to taper …