6:30 a.m. 8 miles easy. Legs felt a bit heavy and tired for first 2 miles but then things began to improve. Should have fully recovered for Saturday's 10 miler in the hills, with 3 miles climbing at threshold effort.
On the training front, for the next 24 weeks I'm doing base/foundation training. The miles will range between 100 and 115 per week. Each block is three weeks. A long run on Mondays (14 at the moment building to 20; there will be some jiggery-pokery in the second half of 2 out of 3 of the runs: progression to marathon effort/ sustained effort). Tuesday is an easy day (8 miles + 6 miles, building the morning runs to 12??? - help/suggestions required - + core work after morning run). Wednesday is speed day: efforts in the 3k - 10k range, including strides for form. Thursday and Friday are easy days: (8+6 and building + 8x8sec hill sprints on one of the days, supplemented with core on one day and strength on the next). Saturday is Threshold day. Week 1 - hill climb at threshold effort - starting with 10 miles with a 3 mile climb at threshold effort, building to a 6 mile climb). Week 2 - Threshold run, starting at 24 mins, building 2 mins each time. Week 3 - Aerobic threshold/Marathon Tempo effort, starting at 45 mins and building. Sunday is an easy day (8 + 6). I think this touches all/most bases. All runs are preceeded by 20 mins A.I.S. and 5 mins gentle dynamic stretching. All runs are finished off with some gentle short hold static stretching to align fibres. My nutrition is pretty hot. I'm also lucky that I can drop in lunch-time naps - don't be jealous.
The above is to get me in shape for 12 weeks of marathon training plus a two week taper. The marathon is in March 2013. It wil be my first marathon. I intend to start racing around Sept/Oct. In an ideal world I wouldn't do a marathon until I had 3/4 years aerobic work under my belt. But the kids want me to run the Tralee marathon next year so I have no choice. Any comments would be appreciated. I've built from nothing to 100 miles per week over the last 9/10 months - mostly easy running and the odd progression. I've now done 6 weeks of 100 mpw and seem to be ok on it. Prior to the 100mpw I did a 4 week block: 2 wks x 90, 1wk x 84, 1 wk x 90. Then going backwards, a similar picture with 80 and 70 and 60 and so on.
2:30 p.m. - 6 easy miles.
| 