Last week of Taper (maybe)

So the Erie marathon is next weekend and I"m leaning towards going.  If this crazy heat that we've had this past week continued on, I would not have gone, but the weather forecast is borderline.  I had decided a few weeks ago that I would only do Erie if the low temperature for race day was under 15C.  Any warmer, and I think it would be too warm to run a good time. I've been monitoring the extended forecasts for the past week and it's hovering around that temperature.  I'm not sure which forecasts are more accurate so I figured I would check them all. Today 8 days before the race, the forecasts are looking as follows.

Accuweather

Weather Channel

Weather Network

Weather Underground

All the US sites are reporting under 15 for a low and the Canadian one is reporting 16C.  So it's still a bit iffy.  Race starts at 7am which is just after sunrise so I don't think the high temperatures for the day will come into play.  Adding to this is that the extended forecasts for September 20th in Rochester NY, which is a marathon a week later that would allow me to double dip for Boston, is forecasting almost perfect marathoning weather with a low of 10C and a high of 12C. Rochester is a bit hillier course so I'm not sure the better temperatures would offset the hills.

Hopefully the temps will drop down a bit more for Erie that will make the decision easier. Where's that Canadian arctic air when you need it?

As for training this past summer, I think it's been okay.  I loosely followed the Pfitz plan, but didn't do all of the extended LT runs.  My goal was just to build upon, but not necessarily crush training to at the very least maintain my fitness level.  Total mileage is about the same, but the quality probably wasn't there.  Fitness wise though I think it's probably about the same or maybe a bit better than it was back in May, if only due to increased aerobic fitness.  However I'm a bit heavier, maybe only 1-2 pounds so not a lot but from what I've read that could add a few seconds/mile to marathon pace.  As for the pace I'd like to aim for, I think 3:13:15ish is around where I want and maybe I'll adjust in the later parts of the race if I'm feeling good.  This is around 7:22.6 min/mile and 4:34.8 min/km.  Yes I realize this is anal retentive like precision and is only about 1 second faster than the pace I ran back in May, but the courses were different. Whereas Goodlife was a course with a big elevation drop, Erie is flat so I figure that the Goodlife course probably added a few extra seconds to my average pace so I'm hoping that a summer of training will get me those seconds back plus one more.