Mileage PR

This week, following the 12 week Pfitzinger plan, I ran my highest mileage ever. This is not going to be impressive to any of you who have every run a marathon, I promise. For some reason, throughout college and even Ironman training, I've never broken (to my knowledge, at least), the 45 mi/week mark. Until today.

Today's 20 miler, even though I died a slow death the last 3 miles, pushed me to 48 miles for the week. I mentioned before that I'm trying really (kind of) hard to follow this plan, but actually I was supposed to hit 55. Knowing my past mileage PR of around 45, 55 was just a bit too much. Oh, and also, I skipped the whole "7 of the 12 miles at half marathon pace" part of Friday's workout in favor of running 10 miles at an easy pace with a friend.

Really the biggest news for the week is that I actually registered for the marathon that I've been running all this excessive mileage for. It's in 5 weeks. Considering the disaster that was miles 17-20 today, I'm excited that I'll be well tapered for the actual race.

I think part of my problem today was ole Bob Seebohar from last week's USAT Clinic. I mentioned he is big on training the fat burning zone and consuming fewer carbs. Apparently my subconscious has committed wholeheartedly to this training technique, because, in my delusional state at about 15 miles in, I decided to change my route and not go by home. Home is where the food is. At least I burned about a half pound of fat today, so I'll be lighter on race day, if nothing else. 

I know a good bunch of carbohydrates was burned at mile 18.3, and again at 18.7 when I ran by a crazy yapping black chihuahua-like dog who dared to chase me down the street (I had to turn around at 18.5 and face him both directions). My heart rate skyrocketed when my legs realized they had little choice in making a quick escape. I had to challenge him back with yelling and running straight at him. Luckily it worked.

I'm starting to think about marathon pacing now. I read on Joe Friel's blog that the #1 mistake athletes make is poor pacing. I don't disagree with that, but do disagree that emotion is my biggest problem. I really don't know what I am capable of running at this point. I know I have run one marathon (my only flat out) with a negative split, and have negative split an IM marathon, which is how the fastest races Joe has coached have been run. He says it's a hard skill to learn, but I'm not sure if it's just an underestimation of your ability or, in my case, a complete lack of ability to guesstimate a realistic pace. I don't remember ever running  while checking mile splits in any of these races. I hoped it was just my central governor telling me how fast to run. Or maybe it was just comfortable and I knew I could hold on. I don't know. So I'm going to make it extra hard on myself and try to stay with a pace group. Nothing like running someone else's pace, right?

So marathon veterans, how do you do it? I was recently telling someone my almost 3 hour time differential between my fastest and slowest marathons. Obviously, I don't know; the 6:23 one felt harder than any 3:30ish ones I've run (except for the lying on the side of the road part). Maybe I'm overthinking this, just like I overthought the decision to actually register. Help?