running on fire by elovett

Well, I recently decided to run a marathon.  The idea came from watching my wife complete her first half-marathon and I was inspired.  I have completed a few short triathlons, nothing longer than a sprint, and have never actually run more than about 6 miles.  But seeing her complete this race, and quite handily, I thought wow what a great way to find out what your really capable of.  I mean triathlons are a lot of work but you are always moving from one sport to the next; in effect using different muscle groups.  With a marathon on the other hand it is just you, a pair of shoes and the road, one activity for 3... 4... 5... 6... hours.  

So here I am training for a marathon, I have been doing so for about four weeks now.  The road has to this point been difficult.  To begin, my wife and mother got together and thought it would be really cool to give me a trip to my undergraduate college to run the Knoxville Marathon.  This wans't a a huge surprise and I had been planning on running  a race about a month later, but I was totally surprised and was really planning on building a "base" and then starting the program.  Instead I was informed that this would be happening, and happening in 17 weeks, one week sooner than the shortest training plan I had found on the internet.  So I launched an all out assault on my body and began right away.  The first week ended with a 8 mile run, and this is where my real problem began.  Knee pain.  I have shaken it to this point but it still plagues me and will, I'm sure, be mentioned throughout this endeavor.