February Training: Heat and Humidity Oh My

February was a fairly productive month of training. Training for the Los Angeles Marathon happening in a few short weeks, it needed to go well. Half of February was routine, and the other half was vacation. I had several long runs and raced more than I had.

In all, the last couple of months of running have been looking up. I’m definitely not in the same shape I was in 2020 but it’s slowly looking up and coming together.

Miles run: 254

Range of Paces: 6:51-15:30-untimed

Shortest Run: 1.15 miles

Longest run: 20 miles

Rest days: 3

Workouts: 3

Races:

Surf City Half Marathon (1:36.53)

Boney Mountain Trail Half Marathon (2:23)

Marvelous Aloha Run 8-Mile Race Recap

Hawaii Running Lab Kailua 10 Miler (1:15.57)

Thoughts:

Now looking back, that was a lot of longer races. I didn’t realize I raced every week. But I didn’t view them as “all-out efforts”; more long runs with more hard efforts in them. Most of my long runs came from a race (Surf City 13.1 or Hawaii Running Lab 10 Miler) with added miles to complete 20 miles. I won’t lie; it’s not exactly the most enjoyable thing to run a 10-mile race and then run eight more miles. But I know it helped me with my long-term goal of finishing the marathon strong. I don’t really enjoy just running 20 easy miles so it helped break up the boredom of that.

Hawaii was a lot of fun, but returning from vacation has left me depleted and tired, and I opted for primarily easy running the last week of Feb.

Running in Hawaii was fun but challenging. It was hot and humid, a stark difference from the 20-30 degrees in the desert during winter. Plus, there were people everywhere, unlike the desert where I rarely seem anyone. But it was a good awakening to the weather that the LA marathon could be. LA Marathon could be hot and humid, or ideal, or who knows, it could also be cold and bitter (we did get snow the other day). It’s not a predictable area (although there aren’t many predictable weather areas these days).

As far as training, it was all fine. I didn’t have any great workouts, but I had a lot of decent ones. I keep telling myself that decent activities are still better than no workouts, and I’m hoping I’ll feel a lot better with taper. Marathon training for the first time in four years has been challenging. I know I was this tired a few years ago training for NYCM, but I don’t remember it. Plus, balancing being in the office full time and running high mileage has not been easy either. I feel lucky I can telework sometimes because that has been helpful.

Anyway, in short, training has gone well so far. This week (the first week of March) is my last big week of running, and then it’s mostly into taper with Los Angeles Marathon on March 19th. After LA I’ll take some time off than likely run shorter things over the summer. Marathon training in the Mojave Desert summer does not exactly sound appealing.