Fourteen weeks gone in my training towards my first marathon at Chester.
Week 14 highlights:
* 39 miles this week.
* Cross country practice.
* "Pacing" at parkrun.
* 1500 miles for the year.
The taper is beginning to show as that's my first sub forty mile week for quite some time. The running I have done this week has mostly been shorter distance but higher intensity. I can feel the difference in myself for the lack of miles in the legs: I'm not feeling as knackered as soon from the fast stuff.
I've signed up for this season's cross country with Royton Road Runners, as I've mentioned this is something I've never tried before; at school I would run out the gate and walk the short cut! On the plus side it did mean a new pair of trainers, which is always good. Though my wife might not agree with that!
Given that I've never done much, if any, off road stuff before I wanted to get a trial run in. Never one to miss an opportunity to get his name in the blog my good friend Mark suggested a couple of evenings in some fields. How could I resist?
One of the courses we will be racing on is next to the Alexandra Park home of Oldham parkrun so we thought we'd go off and investigate, having no idea where the course might go, or indeed, where we were!
People have told me before that going off road will be a good change in my running and good fun. I couldn't agree more! We were like two kids plowing through puddles and patches of mud. I've not had so much fun running for a while. I may even give one of Jason's races a go now instead of wimping out! Either way we'll be out this Tuesday giving the Heaton Park course a try. We know where that one goes...
I can't wait for the cross country to start now. The first fixture is next Saturday but I'm not sure I'm going to do that one, it's a bit of a ball ache to get to and I want to run Oldham parkrun in the morning. May have to wait for the second race.
Back at Oldham parkrun we have been trying to get some pacers organised. Over the past few months one regular volunteer has paced but it has never really been advertised to the rest of the community. Along with two other runners I volunteered to pace and ended up with the thirty-five minute slot. This is over fifteen minutes slower than my course PB and without wanting to sound big headed I was a little concerned that I might struggle to do that pace.
So it turned out, despite doing the first two kilometres bang on time I stopped looking at my trusty Garmin and it wasn't until I could see the thirty minute pacer ahead that I realised I was going nearly two minutes a kilometre too fast! If you were trying to use the thirty-five minute pacer on Saturday I'm sorry.
It was only the first time it has been done so hopefully we can give it a try again next month and just might do a better job. Assuming they let me pace again!
At the start of the year, long before I'd decided to do a marathon I set a goal of fifteen hundred miles for 2013. Doing all these long runs and logging over two hundred miles in one month meant that I knew I was going to beat this goal. Just didn't know I'd do it before September was out. I guess I need to revise my goal, but to what? Even with some time off after Chester I'm going to have to be back running soon as I have a ten mile race a month after Chester. Two thousand miles? I think I'll beet that too, but at this stage it sounds like a good goal to go for.
My Sunday long run this week was about twelve and a half miles, which after some of the runs I've done recently really doesn't feel like a long run. However today I decided that as I wasn't going as far I would try and run a chunk of it at about what I hope my marathon pace will be. I think I made it harder on myself than it needed to be by not taking any water or gel with me. Water would have been good as it was a humid morning in Manchester. Even so I felt really good and can see the benefits of tapering, even if I constantly want to go for a run.
So not long to go now. The hard work has been done and now it is about been as fresh as I can be a week on Sunday....
Week 14 highlights:
* 39 miles this week.
* Cross country practice.
* "Pacing" at parkrun.
* 1500 miles for the year.
The taper is beginning to show as that's my first sub forty mile week for quite some time. The running I have done this week has mostly been shorter distance but higher intensity. I can feel the difference in myself for the lack of miles in the legs: I'm not feeling as knackered as soon from the fast stuff.
I've signed up for this season's cross country with Royton Road Runners, as I've mentioned this is something I've never tried before; at school I would run out the gate and walk the short cut! On the plus side it did mean a new pair of trainers, which is always good. Though my wife might not agree with that!
Given that I've never done much, if any, off road stuff before I wanted to get a trial run in. Never one to miss an opportunity to get his name in the blog my good friend Mark suggested a couple of evenings in some fields. How could I resist?
One of the courses we will be racing on is next to the Alexandra Park home of Oldham parkrun so we thought we'd go off and investigate, having no idea where the course might go, or indeed, where we were!
People have told me before that going off road will be a good change in my running and good fun. I couldn't agree more! We were like two kids plowing through puddles and patches of mud. I've not had so much fun running for a while. I may even give one of Jason's races a go now instead of wimping out! Either way we'll be out this Tuesday giving the Heaton Park course a try. We know where that one goes...
I can't wait for the cross country to start now. The first fixture is next Saturday but I'm not sure I'm going to do that one, it's a bit of a ball ache to get to and I want to run Oldham parkrun in the morning. May have to wait for the second race.
Back at Oldham parkrun we have been trying to get some pacers organised. Over the past few months one regular volunteer has paced but it has never really been advertised to the rest of the community. Along with two other runners I volunteered to pace and ended up with the thirty-five minute slot. This is over fifteen minutes slower than my course PB and without wanting to sound big headed I was a little concerned that I might struggle to do that pace.
So it turned out, despite doing the first two kilometres bang on time I stopped looking at my trusty Garmin and it wasn't until I could see the thirty minute pacer ahead that I realised I was going nearly two minutes a kilometre too fast! If you were trying to use the thirty-five minute pacer on Saturday I'm sorry.
It was only the first time it has been done so hopefully we can give it a try again next month and just might do a better job. Assuming they let me pace again!
At the start of the year, long before I'd decided to do a marathon I set a goal of fifteen hundred miles for 2013. Doing all these long runs and logging over two hundred miles in one month meant that I knew I was going to beat this goal. Just didn't know I'd do it before September was out. I guess I need to revise my goal, but to what? Even with some time off after Chester I'm going to have to be back running soon as I have a ten mile race a month after Chester. Two thousand miles? I think I'll beet that too, but at this stage it sounds like a good goal to go for.
My Sunday long run this week was about twelve and a half miles, which after some of the runs I've done recently really doesn't feel like a long run. However today I decided that as I wasn't going as far I would try and run a chunk of it at about what I hope my marathon pace will be. I think I made it harder on myself than it needed to be by not taking any water or gel with me. Water would have been good as it was a humid morning in Manchester. Even so I felt really good and can see the benefits of tapering, even if I constantly want to go for a run.
So not long to go now. The hard work has been done and now it is about been as fresh as I can be a week on Sunday....
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