I did not feel well this weekend.  It was like I had food poisoning or the stomach flu.  I had food poisoning before and it felt very much like that.  I was throwing up like you read about.  While I have trained while sick, I just didn't feel that jarring my body on a long run was going to be a good decision.  I especially needed to stay close to home.  I am extremely disappointed.  I would like to run the Honolulu Marathon, but I can't prepare correctly when I miss long runs.  If you folks have been reading my posts you know that I am very dedicated to my workouts.  So missing an important run really depresses me.  This morning, I felt a bit better.  My stomach still felt a little wierd.  Not as bad as Friday and Saturday, but I still had that unsettled feeling.  I considered doing a run, even if it was a medium length run, however, I had a commitment to my youth football team.  I am the head coach for the Vikings, a bunch of 7 and 8 year olds and we had a playoff game today.  I didn't want to make myself sick and miss the game.  Oh, btw we won 32 to 6. 

Ok, so I will just slide back into my schedule.  The good thing is that I was about 3 weeks ahead of schedule as far as mileage and long runs.  Tomorrow, I will begin week 7 of my 18 week marathon training program.  I need to run 4/6/4/12.  Although I am scheduled for a 12 mile long run, I may go for 13 or more.  I will make that decision later this week.  Another problem I have this week is that I normally go to bed very early on Friday evening and wake up at 4am on Saturday to begin my run.  It has been hot and humid lately so I need to be on the run while it is dark and cool.  Well, this Friday I will be going to a high school football game on Friday evening (my wife is a high school teacher and we like to support the school).  As a consequence, I won't be able to go to sleep early on Firday evening.  Therefore, I will need to get up extra early on Friday and do my long run before leaving for work.  Man, this marathon training is nuts.

Since I couldn't do my long run I decided to read up on the benefits of doing long runs.  First of all, Hal Higdon states, "do not cheat the long runs".  Oh great!  I cheated myself out of my long run.  Anyway, my research revealed that these are some of the benefits.

Benefits of the Long Run

  • Provides the necessary endurance to complete the marathon.
  • Strengthens
    the heart (increases stoke volume) and opens the capillaries, both
    sending energy to working muscles and flushing waste products from
    fatigued muscles.
  • Other
    physiological benefits include the increased number and size of
    mitochondria and increased myoglobin concentration in muscle fibers.
  • Strengthens the leg muscles and ligaments, thus improving your endurance.
  • Recruits fast-twitch muscle fibers to help with slow-twitch tasks (like running a marathon).
  • Teaches the body to burn fat as fuel.
  • Develops
    your mental toughness and coping skills, thus increasing/enhancing your
    confidence level that you can go the full marathon distance on race
    day.
  • Increases your overall speed, even for shorter races.