Running For Trevor

excellent work Rachelle! These tempos are showing great improvement. Fluids? hmmm...just had an interesting conversation :)

Awesome workout Rachelle! I feel like driving down to bring you a giant slurpee myself! You deserve it girl.

10 MILE TEMPO....wow!!! Those are some smoking fast times! I don't know how you do it without water! WAY TO GO!!!!!

Have you ever tried using a handheld water bottle? I use an Ultimate Direction and I love it. You can actually drink without spilling water while you run fast. It works great.

Great tempo Rachelle! What is your longest tempo going to be for this build-up?

You're hitting these perfect (and faster and faster) every time out! There is no better way to prepare for the marathon than these kinds of workouts - the LONG ones... the ones you dread a bit. They tell you exactly where you stand... there's no faking it.

If you are running a loop near home, you could always leave a bottle out. But them you have the option of stopping every couple miles if you do it that way :-)

Andrea - that is a great question I am kind of just taking it one week at a time with this training cycle. But it will likely not be more than 13-14.

Jake - Thanks they are definitely hard and each week I think there is no possible way I could add extra miles. But this is the 3rd week and I am maintaining the pace with the added distance so that definitely feels good. As far as the hydrating goes I am not so concerned on these tempos but really just need to practice for the marathon. Drinking has always really slowed me down in marathons and the faster I get the more the little things matter.

Scott - Yes I do have a handheld that I used for the ultra Ragnar. It did not bother me too bad but I don't think I would ever use it for a marathon. I'll have to look into the one you are referring to. Thanks!

I don't know if there is that much benefit in going beyond 12-13 for the longest tempo run. Even Meb K said his longest was 12 before the Olympics. I did that one 16 miler before Boston and that might have been a little too much - physically I handled it ok, but it was just mentally draining to stay focused for that long, running solo. Its important to find the balance b/w what you physically CAN do, and what is actually beneficial.

Based on the fact that you've already run 2 very good marathons this year, you know what you are getting into and what to expect.

Thanks for the feedback Jake!

Rachelle, I think you are on track for 8-10 minutes of improvement in your marathon time. I am SO IMPRESSED with the workouts you are hammering. I need to start drinking your kind of Slurpee.

holy flip and to think I ran these kinds of tempo runs last year!! really did I??? who was THAT girl!! I think you took her over and in good form!!! :D. ONE question-- do you even stop during these tempos???

Kam - Thanks I am thinking 3:05 is sounding incredibly realistic at this point.

Julie - No I definitely do not stop! Until they create a race that allows me to stop every mile I will not practice stopping. Stopping is one of my biggest pet peeves about training. When I trained for my first marathon we would literally stop like every 3 miles for 10+ min. I would finish my 20 mile training runs (30+ min worth of "breaks") with an 8 minute pace and think I was a complete rockstar. Oh yeah and we would do our entire runs down the canyon. Get a ride up to the top and then run down.

Rachelle, from what I am seeing, you should consider a 3:05 a worst case scenario, C or D-type goal.

Rachelle I have to laugh at what you said about stopping. Its the same reason I take short rests on interval workouts - there's no breaks during races, so you should practice running, not resting! :-)

The breaks during long runs things is something I feel like a lot of people don't understand. Once you stop for more the 60-90 seconds, you've sort of defeated the purpose of the long run from a cardio perspective... which is the main purpose of the long runs. Its very important to keep moving and keep the heart rate elevated.

You've come a long way from training for that first marathon, in a short period of time! So awesome when you think about that.

Your description of training for your first sounds exactly like how my mother trains. She's 65, runs marathons in a little over 4 hours. It all depends on what you are going for, right? Long runs are supposed to be challenging and a preparatory tool. Stopping sucks.

Jake - that is interesting about the 60-90 second window. It makes sense but is just something I never put too much thought into.

Kam - You are right that it definitely depends on what you are training for. Long runs used to just be social hours for me but now that I am actually training for marathons (not just trying to cover the distance) they have become more of key workouts.

You are still getting the miles in, and there is a musculoskeletal stress/adaptation that occurs - but in terms of training your aerobic system to become really efficient and stronger, you gotta keep moving.

Like Kam said though, it depends on what you are training for... running to finish in a decent time - stopping is not a huge deal... but when you are training to really "RACE" it... then you might benefit from approaching it differently.