I’m almost at the two-month mark since upping my mileage at the beginning of August. I did about 72 miles in August, up from an average of less than 50 per month the prior months of the year. With 3 days left in September I’m over 80 miles, with a couple of runs left to do:

A few notes on how that’s gone so far:

• Slowing down my pace has been essential to push the activity durations higher (obviously, to lower the average HR).
• After the first couple of weeks I started to get foot pain on the sole of the feet. Of course the distance increase is going to add stress all over, but I’ve also tried improving posture by standing up straighter and pulling the shoulders back, while also keeping the cadence more consistent.
• To help with the foot pain I got some better shoes to help with supporting my very-high arches. Anecdotally so far this has helped a lot. The On shoes I’d been running with are light and speedy, but lack support for my feet.
• Running while monitoring my HR zone is helping a lot to get in the distances I’m targeting. On longer runs I just get my HR into the range I want and adjust pace and cadence to keep it there.
• Once I get past the half-marathon, I’ll probably reduce the number of weekly activities but raise my average miles on each one. Back-to-back days are leading to some morning soreness I could avoid with more rest days.
• At this rate I should easily break the 500 mile goal, and probably reach 600.