Alcohol, Meditation and Marathon Training

I recently gave up drinking alcohol.  I had a little help from this book:



I enjoyed the book so much that I read a few others, including "The sober diaries" and "The unexpected joy of being sober."  Then suddenly on my Kindle this appeared:



I read it, definitely not my "thing," but it had me looking at things like mindfulness and cognitive behavioral therapy.  All of these books had me thinking about the power of the subconscious and our potential to nudge it in new directions.  Anyways, the next book I tried was:



I enjoyed this read quite a bit.  Then I got "The four agreements" for my kindle.



I liked the cover, but not too many new ideas.  It was nice to have some affirmation and it was sort of part of my effort to reprogram my mind for less stress and anxiety.  I'm currently wading through the tome, "Full Catastrophe Living."



This book along with Dan Harris's book got me thinking: "Is it possible to meditate while running?"

It seems like a good match.  You are definitely practicing mindfulness.  You can focus on your belly breathing, your feet, your glutes, the wind in your hair, your environment, and so many body awareness places.  Your mind wanders, and you can practice gently bringing it back to your breathing.

A quick internet search shows that I'm not the first to think of doing this. Here is an article in Runner's World.  Heck, there is even an app for it here. Others have blogged about it.

So, no caffeine, no alcohol, and now I'm in to meditation, while running, which means it must be time for a...

Full marathon

I've run 11 half-marathons.  I'm in a new age bracket.  I needed to tackle a new challenge.  I don't think I'm going to get much faster, so it was time to improve on the one parameter remaining - distance.

I thought I would use Hanson's for my training:



But the training plan just didn't fit my work schedule for this semester.  So I'm going with McMillan:



His plan worked well enough for the Silicon Valley half, and it's flexible enough for my schedule.  I also wanted a training plan that would have me run the TIME that it should take me to run a full marathon.  I'm thinking I can do it in 3 hours and 40 minutes.  McMillan's plan maxes out at a 22-24 mile long run, which will definitely have me running for that amount of time at my "long run" pace.

The Marathon is in December.  The training is going well.  No nagging injuries, but I have yet to crack 16 miles, or my previous distance record of 19 miles.  Tomorrow I run 17-18 miles.