Rockin' week of running

I managed to total 52 miles of running this week, and I'm pretty sure that's my highest weekly total in the history of forever! Yesterday I did 19 on the trails according to Garmin, so probably a little over and then today I went out and did another 13 on the roads.

I did the 19 with a friend, MO, who let me use his Garmin 310XT and I think I fell in love. That thing is awesome! I loved the vibrate alarm and mile splits. It will be a while until I can buy one since I just picked out some very pricey patio furniture. Ah, home ownership.

Today's run was even better. I left at noon to get some full-sun running in since there is absolutely no protection from the elements at Heartland. My legs weren't completely tired, so I took the first hour of my run at a good pace. Right on the hour mark, I felt the fatigue from yesterday's run set in and I slowed down on the back half. But that is what the second of back-to-back runs should feel like - completely fatigued. Since my longest run is only 24 miles, I'm preparing for the 50 by doing back-to-back long runs on the weekends. By the end, I felt it. I walked up one hill about 2 miles from home and ran the rest in. No 310XT today, so I tried to map out my run on Google.

Worst case, I ran 12.5 miles, but that is taking straight roads (which I did not) so it was probably closer to 13. My overall time: 1:52. For reference, my personal best in the half marathon is 1:56 something. My split at the turn around was 1:01 and that was at 7.5 miles. I'm starting to think I need to try for a new PR in the 1/2 marathon. I knocked out 7.5 miles at an 8:30 min/mile pace the day after 19 on the trails. I know I'm not setting any land speed records here, but for a Midwest farmer's daughter, that's pretty damn fast!

My next task is to see how much sweet-talking/bribery is needed to borrow the 310XT from MO for Heartland. That eliminates the pacer dilemma and would give me some peace of mind about pacing myself through the first half. How many cases of beer do you think one weekend of the 310XT is worth??