A step in the right direction
Posted on August 30, 2010
After 2 weeks of dragging my butt out the door, I have finally found my motivation again. This week was a success! My highest mileage week in the last year and I made sure to focus on balancing my training. Instead of moderate intensity days every time I ran, I balanced faster more intense running with very easy recovery days. The result: 45 miles in 5 days, 2 high quality workouts and a renewed drive to conquer this marathon.
The week
Monday: Cross training and full body weight training and core. Spinning for 30 minutes.
Tuesday: Am: 6 miles with Tim at about 7:40 per mile pace. Pm: 3 miles @ 7:00 per mile pace. I don’t usually double unless I need to clear my head. Today was one of those days.
Wednesday: Cross training and weight training. Core training.
Thursday: 10.5 miles with 10 x 60 second hill runs at faster than 5k race pace with jog down recovery. felt good to stretch out the legs and work hard today. I am hoping that sessions like this will help develop more strength and also make marathon pace seem easier.
Friday: 7 miles recovery running. 8:00+ per mile
Saturday: 7.5 miles recovery day #2. 8:15 per mile
Sunday: Marathon Pace Run. The goal today was to run 2 miles to warm up my body and then straight into 8 miles at planned marathon pace and cool down for 1 mile. My problem is that I have no idea what marathon pace will be , so I guessed 7:15 per mile and thought that if it felt easy I would drop the pace as long as I thought I could go 26.2 miles at that pace. Great run other than some hamstring tightness.
My splits(from Garmin 405): 7:15, 7:13,7:15,7:12,7:02,6:54,6:52,6:49 (course had rolling hills). I don’t think that I can hold 6:xx pace for the full distance for my first marathon but I do think with more training I could get there. So for now I think 7:00-7:15 is a good target. (11 miles total).
Hills Explained: http://www.runnersworld.com/article/0,7120,s6-238-263-264-13520-0,00.html
Want to see fast? For anyone who has ever run the 800 meters…enjoy http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYfNElHP0OY
umm…did I just read “for my FIRST marathon, but with training I could get there”..which, I believe, implies a second. Oh my.
i can’t even imagine being able to do any of that. very impressive!