Indianola — With two Boston Marathons under her belt, countless hours logged and numerous marathons, 5Ks and fun runs jogged, Indianola runner and mother of three Ann Armstrong added another silver to her marathon medal collection last month.

A second place overall women’s finish at the Capital City Marathon May 21 is Armstrong’s third silver finish since returning to her extreme endurance training after a yearlong hiatus following the birth of her third child in 2004. In Capital City this year, Armstrong bested her previous personal record by nearly five minutes.

“I don’t know how I would describe that, it’s a pretty amazing thing,” Armstrong said, searching for the words to express the achievement of beating her personal best. “I just try to better my own time and stay in shape.”

Armstrong’s new best time of 3:05:56 on the 26.2 mile course in Olympia was the 14th best time of all 456 competitors, and it is also an integral accomplishment on her path to break the three-hour time barrier.

“I’m always in training, I generally run at least 12 hours a week,” she said of preparation for Capital City. “It was a new course this year and it was very rural. But I was well-conditioned for it and just ran it smart.”

In distance running, a common strategy is to run the first half of the race slower than the second, in order to end with a burst, Armstrong said.

“That was the first time I’d actually done that, and I think that’s what paid off in the end,” she said.

Now she plans to carry the philosophy into her next race which will be the Seafair Marathon July 9 in Bellevue.

Last year, in her second race back from hiatus at the Seafair Invite, Armstrong surprised herself with a second place overall women’s finish.

“Placing second in Seafair last year, I was completely surprised by that. I had no idea that I would place at all,” she said. “But I’ve been on that path since then.”

Adding to her latest medal count, Armstrong captured a third place overall women’s finish at the Seattle Marathon in November 2005 and a second place overall finish in the Yakima River Canyon Marathon in April.