After a couple of easier / taper weeks in week 7 & 8 and following on from my PB run at The Big Half in week 8, it is back to business as usual for the next month. The injury niggles have cleared, the cold has cleared and no more races to taper for until the Manchester Marathon on 5th April.

After racing the half marathon, I realised that was only the fourth time I have run over 13 miles since running the New York City Marathon in November. I now need to focus on getting the long runs done, so far I have cut 2 short and completely missed 2 with injury niggles.

I need to make sure I get some good long runs in the bank before running Boston. By my reckoning, I have 3 chances at a proper long run and the marathon in Manchester before tapering for Boston.

WEEK 9 – 2nd – 8th March:

The main goal this week is to increase the volume, get back to those 40+ mile weeks and run 17 miles on Sunday.

The legs felt a little tight on Monday but after some stretching and a light foam rolling they felt better. I won’t say great but good enough to get out running.

Easy / recovery runs on Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday. Giving the body a few days of easy work to recover from Sunday’s race.

Friday was the only session of the week, speed endurance intervals this time. Basically a repeat of the 5 mile split progression run from two weeks ago. 3 miles @ 6:50min/mile, 2 min recovery then 2 miles @ 6:45min/mile with warm up, strides & cool down giving a total of 8.9 miles averaging 7:21min/mile.

A good session working at and just below marathon pace. Building the miles and time running at the goal marathon pace, with the aim of hopefully making race day feel more comfortable at this pace. Although, I am not sure there will be anything comfortable about running through Newton with 16 miles in the legs.

Saturday is long bike day and as of this week I am now adding a short easy run straight after the long ride to give more exposure to running after a tough bike session. More geared towards the spring/summer triathlons but I find it also benefits the marathon training by learning to control the pace and heart rate when the body and mind are fatigued. This week was a 3 hour bike with a 4 mile easy run off the bike.

Sunday was the 17 miler, target pace was 7:45min/mile, nothing serious, just building time on the feet and banking a long run after a few failures in this training block.

I am beginning to think these long runs are jinxed, 1 mile into this weeks run, I tripped over a grid and knocked my left knee and ankle hard as well as cuts to both knees and tearing my gloves.

It was tough hitting the pace target in the 3 miles after the fall. I was wondering whether it was worth carrying on. My ankle hurt a lot and blood was running down my legs. I did push on, I HAD to get the 17 miles down, I couldn’t miss another long run.

From mile 4 I found my stride and started to get back on pace. I made up 20secs in mile 5 and was back on 7:45 average pace. The ankle still hurt throughout but I got the run done.

What annoyed me most was my favourite race gloves were ripped and my green Nike Turbo 2 now had blood stains on them. Signs of battle and the hard graft that goes into getting ready for a marathon I guess.

A good solid first week back at it. Big week on the bike as well as good miles run.

Let’s keep building!!!

• Running – 44.9  Miles, 5h 59m
• Cycling –  188.3 Miles, 9h 14m
• Swimming – 3,281 yrds, 56m

 

WEEK 10 – 9th  – 15th March:

The plan this week was to build on the success of week 9’s 17 mile long run by increasing the volume to 18 miles but add in 5 miles @ 7:00min/mile to bring some tempo running under fatigue into the mix.

The week started off well and was going to plan, then on Thursday, it became clear that the Boston Marathon was going to be postponed. To be honest, this was something I had expected so hearing the news didn’t come as a shock.

This was confirmed on Friday…. Friday the 13th, unlucky for runners in March 2020. Along with the Boston Marathon being postponed, the Manchester UK marathon which I was due to be running on 5th April, also got postponed, likely to September or October. Boston has been put back to 14th September.

I am pleased that they made the decision to postpone rather than cancel, at least that gives the opportunity for us to still run the marathon in 2020. The problem I am facing, like many others no doubt, is fitting an additional marathon into my autumn plans. For me that now means I will be racing Ironman Wales on 6th September, then 8 days later running the Boston Marathon and then Chicago 3 weeks after that. Whilst I am not concerned about running Boston & Chicago within a month, running Boston a week after a full 140.6 Ironman triathlon is going to be a challenge. Any hopes of running a sub 3 hour marathon or even a PB in 2020 are off the table, but to be in with a chance of still running Boston in 2020 is something to be happy about in my eyes.

Whether we do get to run on 14th September or not remains to be seen. I am not confident things will have calmed down by then but until told otherwise, it is Boston 2020 on 14th September.

Now I just need to rearrange flights, accommodation, trains and annual leave.

So far what its worth…. week 10 was a running rest day on Monday & Thursday. Tuesday & Friday were easy runs.

Wednesday was Speed Endurance Intervals of 4 x 3 min @ 6:45min/mile & 4 x 2 min @ 6:30min/mile. In total, 8.9 miles @ an ave 7:37min/mile.

Saturday should have been a running rest day but I decided to head out for a run. I wanted to tick off the NYRR NYC Half Virtual 5k so it was a 1 mile warm up and cool down with 5k at a sub tempo pace, nothing too crazy as my legs were cooked from a big week on the bike. Happy to clock in at 19:38 for the 5k and another NYRR virtual race ticked off.

Sunday should have been the 18 miler. 9 miles easy, 5 @ 7:00min/mile and 4 easy. It was a struggle, motivation was super low today, with no marathon for at least 6 months and my next race, Ironman 70.3 Mallorca in May looking very doubtful. I just didn’t have the drive to go out and hit a tough session.

In the end, I got out of the door and as it was pouring down I just pulled my jacket over my watch and ran it to feel. No pace goals, just bank the time on my feet and enjoy running with no goal.

I say no goal but I had signed up to the NYRR NYC Half Virtual 13.1 race to gain entry into the 2021 NYC Half Marathon and today was the last chance to log a 13.1 mile run. That meant there was the pressure of having to run at least 13.1 miles.

That at least gave me the focus to run and to run some distance. Once I hit 13.1, well 13.5 to give a little leeway for dodgy GPS I was mentally done. I just didn’t fancy the remain 4.5 miles so I jogged it back home.

15 Miles @ an average of 7:45min/mile. Happy with that given the circumstances.

Time to re-evaluate the plan for next week and the weeks leading up to Mallorca in May…. if it goes ahead.

• Running –  42.2 Miles, 5h 36m
• Cycling –  166.5 Miles, 6h 58m
• Swimming – 5,058 yrds, 1h 28m