Since finding out that I had been chosen to be an MK Marathon Ambassador (what were they thinking?) and realising that I’d actually have to run a marathon (I’m still only doing one -I’m not kidding), I’m roughly halfway along my ill thought out and hokey training plan (if this was one of those inspirational running blogs, I’d have to refer to it is my “journey” with a photo of me in the lotus position - perhaps with “NAMASTE” superimposed over the photo)…
So, there are two approaches to marathon training:
1. A careful plan, with a mix of intervals, tempo runs, recovery runs, rest days and a long slow run at an easy pace, building in distance, tapering to hit race day in perfect condition.
2. Or… Loads of running! Don’t overthink it – just run A LOT! Why not run twice a day? Why not run two half marathons on the same weekend? Rest days? Pffft!
Obviously, I’d planned it to be approach “1”, but it is tending towards approach “2” a bit – for example on the week of my original blog I’d run 18 miles, last week I ran 49 – a 272% increase! If I extrapolate that out another 3 months - then I’ll be running 133 miles the week before the marathon (I can see this happening!).
However, larger mileages change your body in new and exciting ways that you’re not necessarily expecting –
1. The arms and upper-body musculature of a Tyrannosaurus Rex – before I started running I had MASSIVE guns (citation needed) – but where have they gone? Surely I couldn’t have looked like this before… Yeah... Surely not…
2. No bum whatsoever – and I mean no bum! I am never going to win “Rear of the Year” at this rate - they might as well give it to Carol Vorderman in perpetuity…
3. The toenails of a hundred-year-old tramp… No sandals for me ever again – but fear not, I’ve got a plan for the summer – I’m of German heritage – so I can legally and morally sport socks and sandals simultaneously! And if anyone tries to stop me – that makes them a RACIST!
But still I have absolutely no idea how to pace it on race day. My longest run (so far) is 15.5 miles and I ran it at my totally arbitrary marathon pace to see what it would feel like; and it felt surprisingly easy, a bit too easy really, as my average heart rate was only 130 (my heart rate should be reasonably accurate as I’ve now got a super-fancy heart-rate-monitor – so fancy in fact that it gives me loads of completely unnecessary metrics – I now know that I’ve got an “Average Vertical Ratio” of 7% - cool huh?). So do I re-assess my (secret) marathon goal time; but would the wheels have fallen off at 18 miles? At 20? There’s only one way to find out – especially as my hilariously over-optimistic Garmin reckons I should be aiming at 2:46 – yeah… Seems legit!
Anyway, I can’t spend all day here yakking, I need to do some MOAR RUNNING and sharpish, I haven’t run since yesterday after all!!!
