Getting serious

I've now got 7 weeks of training behind me. There are still 13 more ahead of me but it's already starting to get serious. Last weekend my long run was up to 9 miles. Unfortunately due to a crazy schedule I had to run in the afternoon on a very hot and humid day. I ended up cutting it short by a mile because it was just too much. I was certainly disappointed in myself but I know these things happen and it's not the end of the world. This week I had my first tempo run. This is where you run at a significantly higher intensity level for short periods of time. Speed work. It was fun just to shake things up and I managed to get out early enough in the morning that the heat wasn't so bad. Yesterday my long run was only 6 miles (a fall back week) and it actually felt easy. That was very nice. But next weekend I will be doing 10 miles and the weekend after that it will be 12. The numbers are going up at a rapid pace now and I feel like I'm not ready. Especially after the defeat of last weekend. Of course, I won't be so stupid as to run in the afternoon heat again. Hopefully the summer temps will be easing up (I was actually thinking about how great it would be run in the snow last weekend!) and the training will do what it's supposed to do. In the meantime I'm trying not to think about the 10 miles looming in the not-too-distant future.