Week 19 of 20 weeks to Sub 2:20?

M 9 miles (6:29mm)
T 10.5 miles (6:23mm), 5 miles (7:04mm)
W 8 miles (6:52mm)
T 11 miles including 15X1minute on/off (5:53mm)
F 7 miles (6:50mm)
S 9 miles including Northern 6-stage relays (5:04mm)
S 14 miles (6:03mm)

Total 74 miles (6:26mm)
Weight 138.7 lbs
Body fat 9.5%
Aerobic efficiency 941 beats per mile

So into the first week of taper which sees a big reduction in mile from last week down to just over 70 for the week with a couple of sharper sessions.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that the legs seemed OK following last Sunday’s Great North Run efforts and was ticking along quite nicely in my early runs in the week. Thursdays session was one that Mike had encouraged me to do before London as it gets a bit of speed into the legs and the recoveries aren’t true recoveries but at a more steady effort. I had decided however that I would take it a little easier than pre-London with the Northern six-stage relays in mind, which would make up my second session of the week. The 1 minute 'on' efforts averaged between 4:37 and 5:01 pace and the recoveries were anywhere between 5:45 and 6:13 so all in all a very nice session.

It is in this week that you hope you will start to see a bit of freshness returning to the legs and I was pleased to see on Friday that my recovery run felt virtually effortless, ticking along at 6:50 pace almost asleep! It’s these encouraging runs in the taper that really help build the confidence that it’ll all be good on the day!

Then to Saturday and a trip over the Pennines to sunny Blackpool for the Northern Six-Stage relays. I managed to find myself in the A-Team such is the current list of injuries at the club and I was to run the fourth leg over a course of 6.6km. As any readers of my blog will know I don't tend to do too well at the shorter stuff so this would be a good test with the added pressure of trying to ensure I didn't mess things up for the team! I took over from Patrick Vis who came in in eighth position and although the guy in seventh was only about 5 seconds in front there was a big gap in front of him so I knew it was to be a tough leg to try and get back closer to the guy in sixth, if at all! I caught the guy in seventh after half a mile and got my head down and ran really strongly all the way to the finish. Again, I didn't clock watch which made the whole thing very enjoyable. I just raced. I finished in 7th position having closed the gap to 6th and passed over to Dominic Easter. My leg was timed at 20:47 which is about 5:04 per mile pace. We ultimately ended up in 5th position which wasn't a terrible outcome but certainly with a full strength team we would expect to have been up there. This was a really pleasing run for me personally and good to see some freshness returning. Although I don't think I could have run much quicker, I felt strong at the end almost as if I could have gone around again, albeit a touch slower with a couple of minutes recovery. Of course I didn't and just did a couple miles jog to warm down.

Whilst this week has gone well and I am incredibly relaxed about the race itself and can’t wait to get going, I do actually struggle with this bit of the taper for other reasons. I have suffered with pretty bad anxiety verging on depression this week and the strange thing is it’s not about the potential outcome of the race. That will take care of itself I know that but without wanting to be too melodramatic it almost feels a bit like grief. Grief that the process is almost over. What will I do after? How will I cope without this goal to focus on? I’ve felt miserable, been incredibly irritable and have struggled to see the point in lots of things. What was the point in training this hard and putting everything in to it for it all just to be over? This whole build up and race has completely consumed me for the past few months and in a few short days it’ll no longer be there. How will I move forward and what will I look to do after? I will be OK and my darling wife Hania tells me it will all clear. The fog will rise and there will be other running targets to look forward to. Sometimes I do just wish I wasn’t so obsessive about these things though! I mean it doesn’t matter does it? It only really matters to me. Whatever I run has no bearing on anything in the world and nobody really cares apart from me. Sure if I run well people will be pleased for me as I am for others when they achieve what they want to but no-one can be as attached to your own goal as you are. It just doesn’t work like that and rightly so. Something makes me want to get up at 5am and do the hard miles training twice a day, something drives me to do that, something in my brain tells me it’s what I need to do for my sanity. The reality is that marathon training is a selfish sport and despite me trying to make my training mostly invisible to my family, it isn’t completely and it can’t be. It consumes everything you do. You live and breathe it for weeks and months on end. So maybe this feeling is partly guilt of my own self-indulgence? Whatever it is, it is definitely the darker side of running. It'll probably get darker still as I have already started my carb-depletion before the reload starts in earnest on Thursday. I just have to hope that I can avoid all last-minute hiccoughs and do my hardest to ensure that it all comes together like a dream next Sunday.

Week 18 of 20 weeks to Sub 2:20?

M 12 miles (6:23mm), 6 miles (6:49mm)
T 8 miles (6:54mm), 5 miles (6:57mm)

W 20 miles including 30 mins(3:00), 4X5mins(2:00), 30 mins (5:43mm), 6 miles (6:52mm)

T 11 miles (6:22mm), 6 miles (7:01mm)

F 7 miles (7:00mm)

S 6.5 miles (6:44mm), 4 miles (7:17mm)

S 20.5 miles including Great North Run in 70:52 (5:24mm)

Total 113.5 miles (6:26mm)

Weight 139.5 lbs
Body fat 9.7%
Aerobic efficiency 958 beats per mile

So here it was the final big week of training and I was absolutely determined for it to go well after last week's poor track race. It was to include the biggest session of the campaign as well as a hard but controlled effort at the Great North Run on Sunday as part of my final long run.

I took last Sunday as a complete rest day, simply to try and regain focus for what would be the hardest week with the combination of the volume and the intensity of the two sessions I had planned. I was pleased I did as although I hardly sprung out of bed at 5:00am on Monday morning, I was pretty pleased to be running quite nicely at a strong pace for a 12 miler to start the week. Tuesday was taken a little bit easier as ever to try and have reasonably fresh legs for the big monster marathon session on Wednesday.

When you first see the sessions on paper, you think oh yeah that seems OK but as the day approaches you realise just how hard they're going to be! Especially when you have built up a level of fatigue from the previous weeks' training. Although I was excited about the session the day before you do feel a bit like you do before a big race; unsure of how it's going to go, a little anxious of how tough it is going to feel and also wanting it to go well to give you a strong feeling that all is on track.

I did this session before the Yorkshire Marathon last year and also before London this year too and although it went well pre-Yorkshire, it was pretty much a disaster before London although I did manage to complete it. I did the session then whilst on holiday in Poland and my legs were just absolutely ruined. For the second stint at MP I could only muster 5:36 pace which considering I was hoping for a MP of quicker than 5:27 obviously left me a little unsure of where I was at the time. The outcome of that session though was that it just allowed me to focus on what everyone should focus on and that is to run the best with what the fitness they have on race day and don't force for arbitrary targets. That said I still managed to PB at London so it all ended up fine in the end. So with all that in mind, I was still keen to nail it this time around as if it went well I was still sure that things could yet improve a little further with the freshness the taper brings back to the legs.  

The first 30 minutes was quite good and I was ticking along really well at 5:26 pace around my tempo loop. The 5 minute efforts came in at 5:09, 5:05, 5:04, 5:04 so really strong fro me and what should be theoretical 10k-10M pace.These 5 minute efforts are really quite nasty as they do get the legs really nicely fatigued for that last MP effort. That said I started off the next 30 minutes really strongly. In fact, the pace felt easy because it was a lot slower than the previous efforts but as the interval progresses it really does become hard work and the concentration levels required are very similar to what you have in the closing stages of the marathon. The legs are jellifying and you have too really focus to keep form, etc I managed to hold it all together for a very pleasing average of 5:27 pace. After last week's disappointing track race I was so keen to get a good confidence booster and this sure gave me what I needed. The session was marginally better than pre-Yorkshire marathon as the shorter efforts were slightly quicker on average and as a whole it was miles better than pre-London. Mike encouraged me that there was no reason to have a confidence wobble anyway as he quite rightly reminded me that there is no such thing as a perfect build up. He recalled Charlie Spedding's build up to the Olympics in LA in 1984 and how he had a few shockers/ sub par performances along the way.

Then on Sunday I had my last long run scheduled which was to include the Great North Run as a bit of a tempo effort. Of course I was going into this really rather tired from the cumulative weeks’ training and a massive session on Wednesday. This was never going to be a PB attempt for a couple of reasons; 1) it is too close to Berlin to properly recover from and 2) I wanted to still get in big volume for the week so I wasn’t going to be fresh for it at all.  I stayed up in Newcastle the night before at the University Halls which was absolutely perfect for the start. I couldn’t have been any closer really. I had managed to wangle an ‘elite entry’ off the back of my 2:22 marathon and was luckily enough to have my name on my vest rather than a number, which always seems a little cool. I must admit it felt a bit strange lining up with guys that I consider genuine elites. Guys like Mo Farah (who was just in front of me at the start line), Ryan Hall, Stanley Biwott, Mark Kiprotich, the list goes on! It was also humbling to share the start line with Ian Hudspith, a genuine British Road Running legend, who just shy of his 45^th birthday ran 66:08. Which is around 5 minute miling. Truly astonishing and a time that I can only dream of.


 

So having done a 7 mile warm up and 100 miles in total before the B of the Bang, I knew it would take a while to get the legs going again! Despite the downhill start and a couple of quicker miles, the legs really were tired and I knew it was going to be a struggle. I found myself clock watching in the early miles as I had been thinking to run at a fairly steady 5:25 pace for the whole race to bring me in somewhere around 71-72 minutes. After about 4 miles I wasn’t really enjoying it too much as I had focused on the 5:25s a bit too much rather than just running how I felt so took the decision to just run and enjoy it. So thereafter I ran hard but controlled to the finish without glancing at the watch and it became much more fun! I started reeling in folks that had gone off too quickly and I finished really strongly. I was pleasantly surprised to finish in 70:52 (5:24.5 per mile) and feel that I could have done another three or four miles at that pace on so I absolutely wasn’t flat out. That said, I was tired, very tired and the legs were achy to say the least but then they should after a run (and a week) like that. I was somewhat surprised at the course as I had expected it to feel quicker but it definitely felt quit a challenge and was more undulating than it looks the times I’ve watched it on the telly!

With the last week of big training drawing to a close that is all the training in the bag and I have to say it’s a relief,to get to this point relatively intact. Of course I do have ongoing niggles and cant remember the last completely pain free run with my glute and hamstring issues but at least I can run! Looking back to pre-London at the same point I do feel I am in marginally better shape, but running just under 71 minutes for a half marathon feeling as it did makes me wonder how on earth it is at all feasible that I will run twice the distance at a slightly quicker pace in two weeks time! The jury is still out and thinking rationally I won’t go under 2:20 this time but as I said last week the race will take care of itself now and I can’t wait to see what happen. Thankfully the marathon isn’t always about rationality; it is also about dreams, how much you want it, your hunger, desire and heart. I believe I have those qualities in spades and trust it will all come good on the day. One thing is for sure I will give it absolutely everything to get the best possible result. The taper can do miraculous things to the legs and I just have to trust the training and trust the taper. As Mike pointed out for Berlin, I won’t have run 100 miles the week of the race, I won’t have done a 7 mile warm up, I won’t have done a humungous session just four days before and I will be racing flat out all the way.

Weight has drifted down another notch so now I am at ‘race weight’ and think I should lock the scales away in a cupboard to prevent any last minute worries about how much timber I’m carrying.

Week 17 of 20 weeks to Sub 2:20?

M 10 miles (6:31mm)

T 8.5 miles (6:34mm), 6 miles (6:59mm)

W 17miles (6:16mm)

T 8 miles (6:39mm), 6 miles (6:48mm)

F 7.5 miles (6:50mm)

S 10.5 miles including BMC 10,000m Track Festival 32:26 (5:13mm)

S Rest

Total 74 miles (6:32mm)

Weight 140.5 lbs
Body fat 9.7%
Aerobic efficiency 950 beats per mile

After last Sunday’s win at the Halifax Marathon, the main aim for this week was to make sure I recovered sensibly and then race hard on Saturday at the British Milers Club 10,000m I had planned. I had been put in the B-race which seemed right judging by the other names on the start list and I was confident of smashing out a quick time to beat my road PB of 32:05. I’ll discuss the race shortly but first the rest of the week….

I had always planned on reducing the mileage a little this week to try to be fresh(er) for the track 10k but still wanted to get some decent steady running in. On Monday I was pleasantly surprised to find my legs were in good shape and I was feeling comfy around the 6:30 per mile mark for a 10 miler. Similar happened on Tuesday which gave me confidence that Sunday’s marathon effort hadn’t taken too much out of the legs. I then wanted to get my long run done on the Wednesday with one eye on next week, which is scheduled to be the hardest of the whole campaign. I was really pleasantly surprised to knock off 17 miles in 6:16 pace just clipping along really nicely.

As well as the ongoing physio I have been receiving on my pelvis and sciatica I decided following a suggestion from Mike that it was probably sensible to have a general sports massage which I did on the Thursday. My legs have been ok when running and my injury is definitely improving but I was feeling really rather tight in some places, namely my left calf and right hamstring. Stewart Sanderson, the sports masseur is a semi-pro rugby league player so is quite useful at ironing out creases and he successfully found a few more achy bits that I didn’t even know existed.

And so to Saturday where I had set a target of 31:59 for the 10k but let me be honest with you, I thought I was being conservative. I am a two-time 2:22 marathoner and so theoretically I should be able to run 10k in something around 30:30. Even in heavy marathon training I thought I should be able to get reasonably close to 31 dead. So the strategy as discussed with Mike was to head off at roughly 76/77 second laps which should bring me in under 32 and if I felt strong I could pick it up in the second half but the main thing was to be patient and try to maintain concentration through the hard middle laps. Fail! Off we went and there was a good bunch from Highgate and a few others that were targeting sub 32 so stick with them I thought and for the first few k things were just going swimmingly. Aerobically I felt fine, and the legs were OK if a bit tired. At no point did I feel like I was starting to dig in too deep. I got to half way pretty much bang on 16 minutes and my first thought was that I would easily go under 32 as it still all felt comfortable. When I have done all out 10ks in the past I have been acutely aware of how spent I feel at halfway. Of course you’re not and you can nearly always muster pretty much the same again in the second half but for this time I felt  relatively fine. K splits were 3:12, 3:12, 3:11, 3:11, 3:13. It was perhaps this cockiness of obliterating my target that was my downfall as the 6^th k was a 3:13 so OK but starting to slip a little. And then all of a sudden the group gradually pushed past me. I think at this point I just lost my head and a total lapse in concentration meant my race was quickly over. I really should have been focusing to hold on to the group but before I knew it I was isolated and after that it was really hard to even get close. I am ashamed to say I think I gave up a little at this point. The 7^th and 8^th ks were both in 3:20 (my hoped for Marathon pace for goodness sake!) and then I managed to rally a little in the 9^th and 10^th ks with 3:18 and 3:15 to finish in 7^th place in 32:26.50. I was really annoyed with myself immediately following the race and it did worry me initially that I thought there would be no way of getting to PB shape for Berlin in time, but now things have sunk in a little I’m a little more pragmatic about it. What will be will be and whatever happens on the day, I just want to do the best I can. I am not one to make excuses for my performance when training sessions or races don’t go to plan as I know when I’ve run poorly but on further reflection there may be other factors which resulted in such a woeful effort; 1) I am tired as I’m at the business end of marathon training and did run a hilly marathon last Sunday, 2) I’m not used to racing on the track – different mind-set, not used to the bends, and different surface to tarmac and 3) The sports massage I had may have left me a little less fluid (clutching at straws ;-) ) and 4) I just had a rubbish day. If it was all four of those then I might still be OK for Berlin! If you are at all interested and/or really really bored you can watch the race here on Vincosport. The outcome of the race did really annoy me though and I took the decision to take a complete rest day on Sunday to try and refocus for this coming week, which is to include the biggest session of the campaign as well as a run out at the Great North Run as part of my final long run.

Weight has dropped another half pound to 140.5 lbs and my aerobic efficiency is back down to the sweet spot of 950 beats per mile average. As someone who has quite an obsessive personality (and I know lots of other runners suffer from this too!) I have also become quite obsessive about my weight recently which isn't that healthy and doesn't help with my mental fragility but I do know being as light as possible, within reason, will help with my pace on race day so I am trying to still lose a little bit of weight but reasonably sensibly whilst still having the occasional treat. I have decided however to stop weighing myself every day as it plays on my mind a little too much. I will still take measurements but less frequently and probably on days when I'm feeling most lean!

As a final note for this week I really do believe marathon training to be such a battle of will. Yes, you have to avoid injury as much as possible and be consistent but mostly you just have to keep on keeping. You have to believe that it will all come good on the day. It means taking the crap days with the good and I still believe that I can get into PB shape, whether it’ll be the arbitrary 2 minutes 13 seconds I ideally want I don’t know. One thing is for sure is that when race day comes I am pretty good at keeping the doubting thoughts at bay, in fact I would go as far to say that I don’t do self-doubt on marathon day. ‘10k on the track’ day is maybe a little bit different though. ;-)

Week 16 of 20 weeks to Sub 2:20?

M 8.5 miles (6:46mm), 5 miles (7:11mm)

T 18 miles including 4X18mins (3mins) (5:54mm), 6 miles (7:04mm)

W 10 miles (6:31mm), 6 miles (6:51mm)

T 9 miles (6:24mm), 6 miles (6:56mm)

F 7 miles (6:22mm)

S 8 miles including 2 at MP(5:26, 5:22) (6:26mm)

S 28.5 miles including 1st place at Halifax Marathon 2:47:25 (6:21mm)

Total 113.5 miles (6:29mm)

Weight 141 lbs

Body fat 9.7%
Aerobic efficiency 972 beats per mile

So after feeling in the depths of despair last week, I was keen to have a more confidence building week this week. All in all it went really quite well - some decent miles and a couple of good marathon specific sessions.

I had the Halifax marathon penciled in as my long run for Sunday and wanted to be reasonably fresh for it given I wanted to do it at a steady effort and knew it to be a hilly course, so did my marathon session on the Tuesday this week. The session was 4X18 minutes at cMP with three minutes recovery. I had taken the decision to try to ease in to the session a bit more than I typically do hoping that I would end up feeling surprised with the output of pace as it progressed. The first interval was at 5:27 pace, the second at 5:26 and then the third at 5:24. I was pleased with how things were progressing and was confident of hitting target race pace (5:20s) for the last stint but it wasn't to be. All of a sudden I had terrible gut issues and really needed to 'go'. After that the legs just seemed to give up and my mind was taken up with concentrating on not disgracing myself! That ended up as a relative jg of 5:39 pace. On reflections I was still quite happy with the session, it wasn't perfect and the legs were a little mullered, but I think that was largely down to residual tiredness from last week rather than anything too sinister.

The rest of the week was steady running until the marathon on Sunday. I looked back at my training log from last year and realised that I had been running my steady mileage a lot quicker then than now and so took the decision to put a bit more effort in on my easy days. Strangely my legs seemed to thank me for it as they felt a lot fresher throughout the week than they have done recently from general plodding.

I had spotted that the Halifax marathon was on a few weeks ago and thought I could use it as my final big long run before Berlin. Give it was a 'race' I knew it would feel more enjoyable than a typical solo long run - maybe I should just pin a number on before every long run! I had heard the course was particularly challenging and so it turned out in terms of the undulations. According to Strava, not far of 2,800 feet of ascent in total. That's basically over half a mile straight up which is a little bit ridiculous, given I generally try to avoid hills at all costs! Anyway I really enjoyed it as something different and put in a very even effort all the way around finishing in 1st place with a time of 2:47:30ish feeling very comfy apart from a slightly tight left calf. Looking at my Garmin trace it looks as though it was a perfect even split too which shows I judged the effort really well. Mile splits varied from 5:25-7:45 which shows the extent of the hills! I had to stop for a couple of pee breaks too (not in the 7:45 mile strangely - that was just a mountain!) which was a helpful reminder that I really shouldn't drink anything within three hours of the race. The course did spark a bit of interest in my mind of what  I could do if I raced it all out. I suspect it would probably have been 13-15 minutes quicker so maybe I could be relatively good in hilly races? Certainly something to consider in the future and someone has already mentioned the Snowdonia marathon which may end up being a target in the future....

Weight has come down another touch this week and I have lost a bit more body fat apparently. Aerobic efficiency has taken a step back a little again. I suspect the figure is swayed quite a lot because of the Halifax race and the undulations meant my heart was having to work harder for the pace output, given I usually run flat routes. I feel a lot happier about this week than last and am confident that things are really coming together. I am doing a track 10,000m in Stretford next weekend, so that should be fun. I've never done a 10k on the track before so it's a bit of an unknown quantity but hopefully I should be in good shape to at least threaten the road PB of 32:05!

Week 15 of 20 weeks to sub 2:20?

M 12 miles (6:38mm), 6 miles (7:15mm)

T 8.5 miles (6:50mm), 5 miles (7:01mm)

W 17.5 miles inc 24 mins, 18 mins, 12 mins, 6 mins, 3 mins (3mins) (5:46mm), 5 miles (7:26mm)

T 10 miles (7:12mm), 6 miles (7:24mm)

F 6 miles (7:38mm)

S 10 miles (6:55mm)

S 17 miles (6:35mm)

Total 103.6  miles

Weight 141.5 lbs

Body fat 10.1%
Aerobic efficiency 949 beats per mile

I went into this week’s training super motivated after a strong over distance run last Saturday and on my runs on Monday and Tuesday my legs felt really good giving me confidence that I had recovered really well. I had noticed however that my cardiovascular system was struggling a little as my heart rate was a little higher than it has been recently for the pace output. It didn’t click at the time but I should probably have taken this as a prompt to perhaps take a couple more easy days in the week before trying a session. I didn’t do that and bowled straight into the session which was 24mins, 18 mins, 12 mins, 6 mins, 3 mins the plan being to start at roughly marathon pace and gradually get quicker. The session itself went well with the first section coming in at a nice 5:18 per mile, the second and third at 5:13s and then 5:08 and 4:58 for the six and three minute efforts respectively. It was super hard towards the end and I do think I overcooked the first a little meaning the rest were a real battle of survival. I then felt pretty smoked for the rest of the day and although tried a recovery run, it wasn’t pleasant.

On Thursday and Friday I was in a world of hurt, my legs were in absolute bits and I was completely wiped out so although the plan was always to run easy on these days, the easy was a lot slower than I have been used to recently! I just wanted to run as easy as my body would allow without doing any more damage. By Saturday I was starting to feel a little bit more normal and Sunday’s run was good from a CV perspective despite the legs still feeling quite tired.

Mike had initially suggested putting in a tempo session on the Saturday but we decided that there was just no point even starting it given how wrecked my legs were and also took a shorter long run to ensure proper recovery.

Marathon training is hard and sometimes it is ridiculously hard. I was in a pretty dark place Thursday through to Sunday but think that the easy days that I have taken will hopefully allow my body to absorb some of the hard work of recent weeks and I am confident that I will come through the other side, stronger than I have been before. In a way, I think the ideal marathon build up is to stress your body as much as possible with specificity to the event without breaking. If you can do that and get fresh for race day, you give yourself the best chance of running a stormer.

Weight is starting to drift down a touch and I am getting a little leaner which is really positive and I still have quite a few weeks before I need to be at my leanest so that’s all positive. Aerobic efficiency dropped back a little this week and I think that was probably due to me just being completely knackered from the hard run last Saturday. I will continue to monitor. c950 as an average is still a good place to be but I would like it to get back to c930 as an average before Berlin.

So on reflection of the whole week, it wasn’t quite what I hoped for mileage wise but I am glad to have another 100+ mile week with a top session ticked off. It is the whole campaign that counts and at least I am putting some good consistent work in which will hopefully pay dividends come 27^th September.  Of course, I hope I don’t have any more weeks that are that hard as I say Thursday - Sunday did leave me wondering whether all this hard work was really worth it at times. Each time that creeps into my mind I just have to remind myself of how good it feels on race day; the whole event, the excitement and then trying to deliver on all the hard training.  And then getting a little bit drunk afterwards. :-)

Week 14 of 20 weeks to Sub 2:20?

M 9 miles (6:35mm), 6 miles (7:13mm)

T 7 miles (7:11mm)

W 11 miles inc. 10X60s(60s float), 5 mins easy, 10mins MP (5:56), 5 miles (7:11mm)

T 10 miles (6:45mm)

F 7 miles 7:14mm)

S 27.5 miles including 26.2 at 5:56mm

S 7 miles (7:09mm)

Total 90.5 miles

Weight 142 lbs

Body fat 10.4%
Aerobic efficiency 936 beats per mile

For anyone that read my blog last week will know that it contained two pretty big sessions so it was always the plan to have a bit of a cut back this week and let some of the hard work soak in. Of course, it wasn’t all easy and there were a couple of workouts that are worth discussing! The main focus became the Saturday long run which was to be a full distance run at a reasonable pace. The aim of this really is to have a good length of time on the feet, but not to plod it out either. Rather run pretty steady and pick the pace up a bit towards the end. Of course, I quite like doing these runs largely fasted as it helps the body utilise fat a bit more as a fuel which is imperative for a good marathon. So with an early alarm call, a quick banana and a double espresso I was out the door.

Anyway, the run started off quite nicely and I had in my mind that I wanted to average approximately six minute mile pace as I had done when I'd done the run previously. I do the course on my tempo loop and for the marathon distance it is 18 laps and the stretch back to home! It is both irritating and fun in equal measure counting up and down the laps. I do find it is a good place for this type of run though as it is quite flat and I can just concentrate on hitting steady mile after steady mile without huge fluctuations in heart rate. My word it can get a bit boring though! I think this is quite good for the mental aspects of marathon racing - it is likely that you will have large segments of the race alone, especially in the second half. To be honest I've never minded running on my own in a marathon unless the weather is really bad where you can get some occasional shelter if running in a group.  All was going well and my legs were moving very well and the pace was hovering around 6:05 per mile. I decided to keep at this sort of effort until half way to see how I felt then. I felt really strong and as boredom was setting in a bit I thought I'd pick up the effort a little over the next seven miles to see how it felt. It felt great and my legs felt really strong, stronger than the last couple of times I've done this. This could be down to the easier week in terms of miles. I ran it well the last two times I did but this felt a lot more controlled. Indeed as I got to 20 I decided to pick the effort up a bit more and was seeing 5:45s for the last 6.2 miles or so with the last mile being my quickest at 5:31 feeling like it was solid but nowhere near all out was really encouraging. My HR averaged 158 for the run so about 20 beats below marathon Heart Rate. It's quite funny doing this type of run and comparing it to for example last week's tempo. I found this so much easier than running 15 miles at a pace just 15 secs per mile quicker. Now this could be due to a couple of reasons such as I was tired from the outset of last week's training run and two I am starting to see some of the benefits of previous weeks' training coming through. In all likelihood it's probably a combination of the two. What it also suggests to me is something I have been pondering for a while is that my endurance clearly seems to be pretty strong (I feel I could have run another 10 miles at 5:55s in my full distance run), my speed is OK but my speed endurance is probably my weakest link, so this gives us something to really focus on over the next few weeks. Don't get me wrong this run was not easy and 26 miles is always a long way and at a reasonable pace it will take some recovering from and I couldn't run at this pace every day but as a specific session within the build up I think I pretty much nailed it.

The other session of note this week was an easier session on Wednesday, which was a slight deviation from the plan. Mike wanted me going in fresh to the long run so we cut it back and put in a bit of speed. It was 10X1min(1min at 6:40), 5 minutes easy, 10 minutes at marathon pace. It was a really fun session, in fact it barely felt like a session at all after last week's hard training sessions. The minute efforts average about 4:45 on the Garmin so could be a bit out but even so that's quick running for me and it felt really controlled rather than sprinting! Then the 10 minutes at target MP.... Well I really had to hold back on this as despite my ongoing niggles the pace felt so comfortable. This may have been due to me knowing it was only 10 minutes of effort but it could also be because of the faster minute efforts got the legs moving quickly that 5:15s ended up feeling like a relative jog!Of course I don't expect race day marathon pace to be 5:15s but I wouldn't mind if it was! Let me confirm now that if 5:15 ends up being my marathon pace this time out I will gladly eat my hat.

My weight has dropped very slightly this week which is nice, but could do with a bit more dropping off yet. I was however really pleasantly surprised to see my aerobic efficiency take a giant leap forward to an average of 936 beats per mile, around 30 better than last week. Looking back over my previous training this is the most efficient week I have ever had, showing that some of the hard work of previous weeks is starting to kick in and hopefully that I am starting to bring myself to a peak of fitness that I have never been in before. 

Week 13 of 20 weeks to Sub 2:20?

M 13 miles (6:36mm), 6 miles (7:11mm)

T 8.5 miles (6:52mm), 4 miles (7:10mm)

W 16 miles including 8X1M (1/2M float at c6:40s) (5:53mm), 6 miles (7:14mm)

T 10 miles (6:50mm), 6 miles (7:14mm)

F 9 miles (6:58mm), 5 miles (7:18mm)

S 20 miles including 15 miles at 5:41mm (6:01mm)
S 10.5 miles (6:21mm)

Total 116 miles (6:36mm)

Weight 142.5 lbs

Body fat 10.5%
Aerobic efficiency 964 beats per mile

Quite a chunky week this week with two big sessions of 8X1M on the Wednesday and then a long progressive tempo run as my long run on Saturday.

Firstly the Wednesday session which I was looking forward to as Mike and I had discussed it was worthwhile trying to keep in touch with some of my speedier running during this specific phase and this session would allow me to do that. The aim was to run the miles at about 5:10 pace for the first 6 and then pick the last two up if I could! This was made more difficult by the fact that the recoveries were more of a float steady run than a true jog shuffle type recovery! They ended up being about 6:40 pace so still reasonably nippy, in fact a touch quicker than most of my other general mileage throughout the week.. The miles went well and I was pretty consistent only really struggling on the last one, but even so it was still pretty quick for me given the combined volume and intensity of the session. The miles averaged 5:06 pace, which should be roughly my theoretical 10k pace. Shame I’ve not yet run a 10k that fast! I also actually need that to be closer to my theoretical half marathon pace for 5:20 as a marathon pace to be at all realistic. We can all dream….

The next session had originally been planned to run as a solid tempo run within a 20 miler of 15-20s per mile slower than MP. But Mike decided it’d be ‘fun’ to try and do it progressively;  so increasing the pace each five mile block. I started at 5:48s and I was already feeling it if I’m honest, the legs were quite tired and I could also feel my pelvis and glute issues again. The next five miles I increased the pace to 5:34s and I was starting to grow in confidence that I may be able to go quicker still in the last five mile section. I was wrong. Despite my best efforts I just couldn’t get the legs to turn over quickly enough. Aerobically I was quite comfortable and the HR data suggests the engine wasn’t under much strain, it was just a problem with the wheels! Even though the pace was really drifting I held it together to average 5:41 meaning the whole 15 mile tempo effort also averaged 5:41 which is still within c20s of goal marathon pace. This must still go down as a very good workout and as Mike reminds me this has such relevance to the marathon as it is so specific. The way my legs felt the last couple of miles I have to agree with him, it did feel like those last few miles of the marathon when you feel like you’re sprinting but really you’re starting to tread in treacle… It is intended to get another of these longer tempo type runs in before Berlin.  I then did a decent steady 10 miler on Sunday to round the week off at 116 miles there or thereabouts which was another pleasing step in the right direction.

My weight doesn’t seem to be budging for some reason and I could do with getting leaner as race day approaches and I am sure if I keep doing what I do it will gradually drop off with the heavy sessions and mileage. Aerobic efficiency has improved very marginally this week so not really much change over the last three weeks for some reason but it is still at a decent level.

Reflecting on this week in isolation I am really chuffed as I got a lot of miles in, two pretty monster sessions and all this whilst on a week’s holiday from work doing touristy things around Yorkshire so spent a lot of time on my feet outside of running too which I wouldn’t ordinarily do. Maybe the odd additional holiday treat I have been having (fish and chips, pizza, the odd pint with my mate Adam who was visiting from Poland) may have something to do with the static weight situation. I am slightly concerned to see the return of my injury issues but luckily it is not stopping me from training, it’s just pretty damn uncomfortable most of the time! I will continue to see the physio and do the work she suggests to try and correct my issues. 

Introducing Adam to a pint of Leeds Best. He liked it. So did I!

As a whole I am now seven weeks away from race day (well six and a half if you excuse the tardiness of publication of the blog!) and I am generally pleased with how things are going. It is not perfect but things could be far worse. I am running much better than I was a few weeks ago and I am gaining in confidence. Sub 2:20 still seems a long way off right now but that’s no bad thing. I know I can peak well when it matters and of course I will run the hardest I can on the day and take whatever result comes from that. But there’s a tonne of work to be done before then and I’m looking forward to every minute of it.