Week 1: Three miles

28.1 laps, 1:1 lap run/walk ratio, 51:09 minutes

And the marathon training officially begins!

So, I decided not to go anywhere, but just to run around the house as usual. No doubt when the runs get longer, I'll want to vary the route a bit, but today, I just wanted to get out there and do it.

It went pretty well—I felt fine the whole way, and kept up my pace, averaging just over 17 minutes per mile. I did actually finish walking the final 29th lap as a cool-down, but stopped my watch after 22 steps (1 lap = 218 steps, so .1 lap = about 22 steps) to make it as close to an actual three miles as I could. Still slow, but oh well. I increased my longest run by 1/3 today, which is quite a bit. It was nice to find that the third mile wasn't any harder than the second. Being able to increase the miles without significantly slowing down is more important to a successful marathon than increasing speed.

What would really help me get a little of my speed back, I think, would be to lose about 10–15 pounds. I weigh about 12 pounds more than I did for my last pre-cancer marathon, and I'm sure that's slowing me down. I have been fiddling with trying to cut down on fat and junk food (not that I eat that much of it) while still getting the nutrition I need to keep up with my training. So far... no particular results. But I'll keep working at it.

I rigged up one of my old sports bras with one of the soft, fluff-filled prosthetics that came with my after-mastectomy camisoles. It worked really well, and was much more comfortable than running with a heavy silicon prosthesis on my chest. It's hard enough to find good running bras—finding good mastectomy running bras is nearly impossible. I may do better to just make my own.