For those of you that don't remember, I ran my first ever marathon in February of this year. As per my entry of 3/12/05, I suffered a foot injury (a result of running a marathon in Nike running shoes), which later led to a knee injury. So for the last 8 months or so, I did pretty close to no running....until about 2 weeks ago.

Conventional wisdom says that it takes somewhere between 6 months and a year to prepare for a marathon**. I had a simple goal: get in marathon shape in 4 weeks. That's right, on December 5th, I will be running the first ever Newport Beach Marathon. I'm only up to about 15 miles so far, but I've got another 10 days. I'd like to break 4 hours again, but I feel a little slower than I did a year ago. We'll see how it goes.

**As an aside, my father says that this rule only applies to your first marathon, and that after running one you automatically are in marathon shape for at least a year. It's a nice thought, but I can't say that I've ever seen my father run...ever.