Chicago Marathon - How's the training going?

I got 18 in this morning. I will try to get 21-22 in for a long run next week. I agree the heat and humidity have been brutal especially this week.

 A good restaurant to visit in my opinion is Gibsons Steakhouse. Or you could always go to Greektown, well it isn't really a town, probably a block worth of restaurants. I like the Parthenon.

Its going pretty well.  Did my 17 miler on Sunday, and feel good today.  I am behind on my marathon plan, as I was gearing everything for my HIM on 7/22.  Starting to get more run focused, but an OLY this weekend isn't helping.  After this weekend, it will be 95% running, so that should help.  I don't feel behind schedule, but I don't feel ON schedule either.

Agree with the suggestions on restaurants; you really can't go wrong downtown.

Gotta say, there are two "A" races on my schedule this year -- Spirit of Racine HIM (which was in July) and then the Chicago Marathon.  Now that the HIM is over and done with, I'm having a very difficult time garnering up the mojo to give the marathon training the attention it needs.  I feel like I lack the base for the marathon plan that I've jumped midway into, and that the weekend long runs are a little beyond my capabilities right now.

I've been scaling back some of the workouts, but am now torn between the "really want sub-4 hour" and "really don't feel like working too hard at this".

I'm hoping that racing Pleasant Prairie this weekend (Oly distance) will gear me up for racing again and put me in the right mindset (despite the fact that racing kind of messes with getting a long run in).  And also - like Schmize - once that's done with, I can pretty much abandon the whole swim/bike thing and concentrate on running, which I'm hoping will make me more confident going forward. 

Meaning, Unlike Hangloose, because I abandoned the swim/bike immediately after Racine and am fully rocking on the mary plan.  My target pace of 8:00/mi is probably too fast for what my ability will be on race day.  Being my first mary I'll be plenty happy with sub 4 hr but I'm training for a little faster than that and we'll see how it goes.  Last Sunday was a 19 miler and I felt good at the end.  Much stronger than a run of similar distance a few months ago.