Time flies

A week ago today, right at this very moment, I was crossing the start line of the NYC marathon. The weather is as gorgeous as it was last week, just a little warmer, so it's easy to remember how amazing the day was. It seems like it's been an exceptionally long week, probably because I got sick.

I've been more than casually looking at marathonguide.com this week to see if there is anything in the spring that I would want to do. I don't really want to travel far for it so that limits me to the New Jersey or LI one (I did the LI half last year). Both are in May and the LI half last year was insanely hot and humid, it was a horrible day for me. Plus their medal sucked. So I think I'll stick with my original plan of doing some halves in the spring and looking at next fall for my next full.

It's not just the glory of last Sunday I miss. Now that I've had a week off, I miss the structure of training. I know! Crazy! That's what I complained about most by the end -- the relentless brutality of the training. It was so challenging, mentally and physically. Now that I know I can do it and survive and that the training program I followed got me great results for race day I want to do it again!

This sounds terrible but I don't think I want to run for charity again. I think part of the stress of training was the stress of meeting my fundraising requirement. My friends and family were amazing and got me there. I raised the money for a charity that I know will do good work but the next time I run a marathon it will just be for the sake of running the marathon.

My husband doesn't really want to hear the word "marathon" any time soon. He was wonderful and supportive throughout training and so happy for me on race day. But it's been a lot on him too. We're going into the holidays and between training and all the other stuff we've had over the last 6 weeks and now throughout the year, we haven't had a "down" weekend and probably won't until 2011, so I can see why he wouldn't be jumping up and down at the prospect of doing this again.

I'm feeling better today. I'm still coughing and I think my fever comes and goes but I think I'm on the mend. I probably could get on the treadmill today but I'm not. One more day of recovery will do me a lot more good than a few miles will. I'm looking forward to this week though. My body will be ready and, hopefully, stronger for my efforts last week. Whatever training program or workouts I go into I feel like I'm going to go into them with a new confidence -- that I am a marathoner now and I can push myself harder than I ever thought I could go. How cool is that?!