BOOM! First week of marathon training done, and probably the most enjoyable week of training I’ve completed in a long time 😊 Over the next 12 weeks going to use the Blog to detail what a typical marathon build up looks like for me. I have a plan set out till the 3rd of October but as many marathon runners reading this will know plans can change out of necessity during a marathon build-up. Everything will not go 100% according to plan which is almost a certainty of any marathon runners build up. Key attributes I will need to harness over the coming weeks is both discipline and adaptability. Discipline to get all the planned sessions in! Adaptability to move back a session if needed and to take a rest day when the body is sending you signals that it badly needs it. Overall though very excited to be getting ready for a marathon even though it will be quite gruelling I have noticed already a change in focus and attitude 😊
Weekly Recap:
Monday: 5 miles – 37.42
Tuesday: 7 miles – 49.40
Wednesday: 8 miles Progression – 49.18
Thursday: 4.03 miles – 30.14 & Physio Session
Friday: 7 miles – 50.39
Saturday: Rest Day – No Running
Sunday: 15.43 miles – 1 hour 41
Might not look like a typical week of training of someone out to run a Sub 2.30 marathon time but this week was about upping things slightly without causing flare ups of niggles and injuries I’ve been managing.
2 main sessions this week. An 8 mile progression on Wednesday where I eased into for the first 2k or so before gradually picking things up before easing back off. See mile splits below:
· 7.35
· 6.14
· 5.45
· 5.51
· 5.43
· 5.42
· 5.49
· 6.34
So as you can see the paces we’re a bit up and down during the middle miles but the effort felt like a gradual progression each mile. I purposefully picked quite a challenging route around home that’s very up and down. The reason for this is I believe in a marathon block its really important to put yourself in scenarios that you’ll find yourself in on race day. So for instance when tackling a hill at target marathon effort on race day if you can’t do this in training it will be very hard to replicate this on race day itself. A phrase many people have heard that I try to remind myself when I’m struggling in sessions like this is:
“ To get to the next level you have to get comfortable being uncomfortable”
The other lesson from sessions like this is that whilst on paper the mile splits above might not indicate capability of running 5.30 mile pace for 26.2 miles and that’s ok I know the effort was there and felt akin to 5.30 pace. Marathon effort is a vital factor to keep in mind during marathon training. Although you might not be hitting the exact target splits you wanted, however when you take into account training load that week, tiredness, work etc then the pace you were running at that you deem not fast enough in fact might actually be perfect and any faster might tip you over the edge in terms of fatigue, injury etc.
Got in 15.43 miles yesterday at a decent clip with a good 8 miles in the middle down at 6.15 mile pace. Happy with this effort, got out at 8am yesterday morning to avoid the heat but it was still incredibly warm at that stage. Judging by the amount of people running in Phoenix Park at that time I think many people had the same idea as me 😉 Had flirted with the idea of running a bit further as felt quite good but need to be conscious of nothing jumping up the mileage and load too much too soon!
So as I said at the start of the Blog a really really enjoyable weeks training. I know for a fact I won’t be speaking as glowingly about every weeks training but I’ll take the good with the bad its all grist to the mill for October 3rd. Plan for this week is to move things on gradually without too much overload!
Thanks for reading, have a great week folks and enjoy the class weather 😊
Noel
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