Chasing Dreams, Project 2:20 - Week 11 of 12

M 60 mins HA (6:49mm), Easy 60 mins (7:47mm)
T 70 mins inc. Track Fartlek (6:19mm), Easy 50 mins (7:44mm)
W Easy 80 mins (7:54mm), Recovery 40 mins (7:57mm)
T Recovery 35 mins with a few strides (7:19mm)
F 75 mins inc. aborted Salford 10k (6:38mm)
S 70 mins HA (6:34mm), Easy 50 mins (7:01mm)
S 105 mins inc. 10 miles Easy Tempo (6:23mm)

Total 100.3 miles (6:59mm)
Aerobic Efficiency 986 Beats Per Mile Vs 955
Weight 142.73lbs Vs 142.4lbs
Body Fat 10.62% (15.15lbs) Vs 10.84% (15.44lbs)
Lean Body Mass 89.4%(127.6lbs) Vs 89.16% (126.97lbs)

Fitness 92.1 Vs 93.9
Fatigue 91.3 Vs 102.5
Form 2.5(Neutral) Vs -7.8 (Neutral)

I was hoping to be able to write a smuggish yet humble post this week about how I'd turned up at Salford and absolutely obliterated my 10k PB. As readers will know I even went to the extent of asking for guesses on what I might run! You can tell who think's they're in good shape when they're asking for predictions! It wasn't to be, but more on that shortly.

Last week was a bit poor and things didn't quite feel right as I wrote about before. I had put it down to being away from home on holiday and perhaps a bit of tiredness from the Manchester training run. What i didn't factor in was that I may have had a very low lying virus. In fact that didnt dawn on me until Wednesday evening when I was absolutely wiped out. I slept for ten and a half hours when I usually sleep about seven. I could have done with more too. Perhaps it was my body readying itself for a big effort on Friday? The doubts returned. Don't dig yourself a hole! Should I even bother showing up? I am a rather obsessive all or nothing kind of person and part of me was torn between doing the right thing(not racing) or saving face(racing) after saying I felt I was in with a good chance of beating my PB! Thursday afternoon I felt a lot more energetic but my run wasn't good. The legs felt out of sync and ploddy. Sod it, lets just go and see what happens. On Friday I actually felt fine physically and was ready to give it a good go. I kindly got a lift with colourful Alex Bellew from Renaissance Athlete Mick Hill. Line up on the start line, but I'm a good five rows back. With a rather muted 'go' we were on our way. Sort of. I was absolutely stuck. I could see the leaders pushing off into the distance. If I had any chance of a good time I needed to be in that group. Mick would have been a great person to try and hold on to, having run a very impressive 31:41 last week at Brighton. It was only five seconds into the race and it was already too late. I know what I'm like if I redline too early, I would have blown. OK - settle, try and get there gradually. It takes me until nearly 1k to catch up with clubmates Mike Burrett, Alex Bellew and Liam O'Brien. I try and push on and bridge the gap to the lead group but I'm just too far behind. At 2k it is starting to feel hard, like it should in a 10k. That's fine I tell myself. I'm making no progress, completely stranded. No one to aim for and no one to race with. On I go. By the time I get to 4k I've completely lost it mentally and decided I'll throw in the towel at half way. My brain telling me, it's a sensible thing to do given the virus, you have an even bigger effort to make in just over a week's time. I go through the 5k marker with the timer calling out 15:45. Aerobically and physically I was about how I should feel at that stage but I'm already pulling to the side of the road shortly after. I'm disappointed in myself. I call myself weak and ask what chance have I got next week if I can give in so easily? I march up and down for a few minutes before doing another lap at something resembling a moderate effort. Was it the right call? Probably. But I am still really disappointed  in myself because I know I am in 10k PB shape and this was a good opportunity to do that finally. Sadly on the day I just didn't have the minerals. I promise myself that I will not crumble next week. Having had a couple of days to mull things over yet more, if I had run 15:45 in a 5k the week before a marathon I would have actually been quite pleased so every cloud and all that!

No man's land having already mentally thrown in the towel. Photo Credit: Jerry Watson.

Other than that the week was OK. Another reduction in miles as to be expected and a couple of other decent sessions! Tuesday's track fartlek was actually really encouraging and I thought my legs had returned. Today I have started restricting my carbohydrate intake and will do so until after my run on Thursday. With that in mind I started the depletion with a run of 16.5 miles with 10 miles at an Easy Tempo pace (5:47mm). This felt incredibly comfortable with HR averaging 162 so about 11-15 beats to play with in respect to my Marathon HR. 

Body composition has improved a tad. That said what I found really interesting is that my weigh in's on Wednesday (my most under the weather day) and Thursday according the body composition scales I was retaining a huge amount of water. I suspect this was to help flush the virus away but who knows? Body water has returned to 'normal' levels for me now though and I do feel absolutely fine. Hopefully that is my last bug before the biggy and in some ways I can be happy that I've already had it! Aerobic efficiency is a bit worse but this is likely due to the virus so I'm not concerned about that.

As I have started the taper it isn't surprising to see the 'fitness'  and 'fatigue' has dropped a bit (fatigue drops quicker than fitness) but form (the balance between the two) is creeping up. The aim for this coming week is to heavily reduce the miles ahead of Sunday and try to hit a training stress balance (form) of 20-25 without losing much more than 10% of my peak fitness of 95. 

So what shape am I in for the marathon? I will be putting a blog together that will appraise my training block relative to previous build ups to give me a good feel for where I'm at. Whatever the outcome the plan will be as it should always be; turn up and run the best marathon you can on the day with the conditions and variables you're dealt.