Commiting to Marathon #11 - 52 mile week

It's official. I am signed up for the Last Chance For Boston Marathon in Dublin (Columbus), Ohio, which will be #11. My e-registration is complete. My hotel room, airfare and car rental are all booked. If I BQ, I may go to Boston in April, depending on how Jen's pregnancy goes. I don't want to think about Boston now. I just want to do the best I can in Dublin.

The decision was tough on which race to register. I learned of a contingent from my local running group that are going to Tampa. I spent a great deal of time pondering if I should go back to Tampa today. I even pontificated Austin for a brief moment.

However, I did not want to go these larger city, further away marathons by myself. The wife will not be traveling with me and she is my #1 fan. Plus, it is a bit late to get choice flights and hotels for these larger marathons, so I bagged it. Much more expensive proposition and I didn't want to go it alone. A quick 1-night trip to run a marathon on a fast, flat looped course suits me fine in February.

Most importantly, besides it being the most convenient, I decided on this marathon to revisit an interesting part of my past. Little known fact is that I lived in Dublin, OH from 1998 to 2000 as I began my career with The Scotts-MiracleGro Company. So it is a bit of a homecoming for me.

Despite the challenging wind, rain, ice and snow that hit us this week, I hit 52 miles out of the 54 planned. Tuesday's run in the wet, blinding flurries was not all the fun (I could barely see since I had to do it at night) - but I ran 7:30's for 10 miles. Thursday's 11-miler at 6:00 AM was frigid. The highlight of the week was Saturday's 20-miler at the Aboretum. See splits below.

Off to Connecticut for work on a 6:40 flight to LaGuardia tomorrow AM. The target is 47 miles while away from home until Thursday this week. On pace for 2,098 miles in 2007.