The last update in WEEK 5 & 6 finished up with a bit of a hamstring & piriformis niggle cutting the long run short and missing out on racing a Parkrun. The plan was to run a 16 mile long run in week 6 but that didn’t happen.

It is getting frustrating that I am missing the long runs, that is now the 3rd long run out of 6 which has been cut short and with racing the Big Half at the end of week 8, I won’t be running long again until week 9.

Still time to get those proper long runs done but it is just frustrating that little niggles and illness are hampering training at the moment.

That said, does marathon training ever go smoothly and 100% to plan? you just have to get on with it and do the best you can. The goal still remains the same, just going to have to work harder to get there.

WEEK 7 – 17th – 23rd February:

The main priority this week was to get the hamstring and piriformis niggles sorted and behind me. On Monday I went for a sports massage and to be fair, it is long overdue. The last time I went for a massage was in February 2019 just before flying out for the Tokyo marathon.

I will now make the effort to schedule a massage every 6-8 weeks to ensure I don’t suffer muscle tightness going forward.

The massage went well, she found that my SI joint was not rolling which was pulling on the left hamstring and causing that tightness. After working on the lower back she released the SI joint and after a few stretches she was happy it was rolling as expected. A quick and simple fix to that problem.

She also worked on the calves as in her words, felt terrible. I thought they were feeling pretty good, oops, also the quads had a good going over as well as the ITB. I came out feeling like I had been beaten up but feeling a lot better for it. Let’s see how things feel on Tuesday.

Tuesday and Friday were 5 mile easy paced runs, both felt fine with no aches or pains. The massage seems to have really helped but the big test will be when running at speed and the longer run at the weekend.

Wednesday should have been a big endurance interval session but following Adam & Charlotte’s advice, we pulled this session to not put as much strain on the body. Instead I ran a 6 mile controlled pick up run. 3 miles @ 8:30min/mile and 3 miles @ 7:45min/mile. Happily, not issues from that one too.

Thursday I went rouge and went out for an unplanned run as everything was feeling good. Going against everything I would tell anyone getting over a niggle but I felt ok and wanted to see how it coped with some faster miles. It was only a 5 mile split progression run so 1.5 mile warm up and cool down with 3 miles @ 6:50min/mile, 2 min recovery and 2 miles @ 6:45min/mile. Once again, all felt well. I even tested out some new shoes I was gifted by Hoka, the Rincon. They felt pretty good running at pace and lightweight, I need to do a few more runs in them before I can make up my mind whether I like them or not but its a promising start.

I woke up Saturday morning feeling terrible. I had a few rough nights sleep Thursday and Friday then my daughter woke at 6:30am Saturday. My throat was dry, head and nose blocked and I had no energy at all.

I was due to be doing a cutdown endurance interval session and kept putting it back later and later in the day. I almost messaged Adam to say that it’s just not going to happen but got my shit together and went out at 8:30pm with the plan of just giving it my best shot. The plan was 6x1km @ 4:12min/km (6:45min/mile), off 2 mins with warm up & cool down.

I felt tired and sluggish and missed the pace on the first 1km rep by 2secs, not bad I thought. The other 5 reps I came in under 6:40 getting quicker as each rep went by and I started to wake up to the session. I was really pleased I had pushed myself out to get this one done despite feeling really rough. It would have been easy to have skipped today. 8.5 miles done with an average pace of 7:47min/mile.

Sunday’s “long run” was another cut back session, 10 miles, again, not putting so much strain on the body and with half an eye on next weeks Big Half. I am supposed to run the long runs at an easy – steady pace, usually around 8:00min/mile, today I went out with 7:45min/mile in mind with it only being a short long run….. short long run?? is that even a thing? you know what I mean. It’s not a looooong run.

I still didn’t feel great on Sunday, I had a cold kicking in and Saturday was once again another night with little sleep. Running late on had got my heart rate pumping and I just couldn’t get to sleep again. Like Saturday, the run was put back until early evening but I did get out and was motivated to do so today.

The first mile went by in 7:22, oops, way under the 8:00 and 7:45 target. I decided I would just go for it and run the full 10 at 7:20, it’s not really a fast pace, marathon pace plus 30secs. So 10 mile banked at 7:19. Nice to get out and stretch the legs over a slightly longer distance.

As the week progressed, I gained more confidence in my hamstring and piriformis. They feel totally fine now. I just need to sort out sleeping and getting over this cold before race day next week. It’s been a rough couple of weeks on the running front with little going to plan.

• Running –  42.9 Miles, 5h 38m
• Cycling –  35.1 Miles, 1h 30m
• Swimming – 16,760 yrds, 4h 43m

 

WEEK 8 – 24th February – 1st March:

This week is race week, although not an A race we have decided to taper a little and give this Sunday’s half marathon a good shot, depending on the weather the plan is to attempt to run a PB. The rate races are being cancelled due to COVID19 fears, this may well be my only race for a while, who knows.

Monday was a day off running and I was thankful for that. Tuesday was an easy run and by the time Wednesday’s session came around, the cold was starting to die down.

The main training session this week was that Wednesday session. It was just a 20 min volume split tempo run. 1.5 mile warm-up, 2×15 sec strides, 10 min @ 6:50min/mile, 3 min recovery, 2×5 min @ 6:40, off 2 min, 3 min recovery and a 1 mile cool down.

This session was more about getting the legs moving at pace and banking a bit of time around marathon pace.

Thursday & Saturday were short shakeout runs with Sunday being The Big Half, I have posted a separate blog for my The Big Half Race Recap.

That wraps up this two week update, the plan from next week is to pick things up in distance and intensity again after a few days easy recovery and hopefully!! Get some good long runs done, I can’t afford to miss any more, especially now we are getting into the proper long runs.

• Running –  30.6 Miles, 3h 51m
• Cycling –  56.6 Miles, 2h 30m
• Swimming – 2,816 yrds, 52m

To see how the next two weeks went, check out BOSTON MARATHON TRAINING: WEEK 9 & 10….. RACE CANELLED!!