Marathon Training - Week 9

An enforced break from blogging whilst I have been away on holiday.

Managed to miss only three training sessions whilst on holiday. Due to being on a fly-drive of the western parts of the US I had to move a lot of the sessions around to match up with locations and temperatures. This meant that I had to do an 18 mile run on the Friday morning that we were due to fly out to LA. I followed this up with 5 miles near the LA airport hotel, another 4 miles in Lake Havasu City (amazingly hot, even at 6am), 10 miles in Williams near the Grand Canyon, 7 miles in Las Vegas (up and down the Strip), 5 miles in Sequoia and another 5 miles in Yosemite. I then did a 20 mile long run on the Tuesday in San Francisco where it was much, much cooler. Considering that in the afternoon we went sightseeing (on segways no less) and went out drinking in the evening I felt fine. My last run was a 5 mile run, in Oxnard, near LA. It was meant to be an 11 mile run but I had stomach problems and had to cut the run short!

Running abroad was both a challenge and exciting. The challenge was trying to fit all the training into the schedule. This involved getting up early (around 6am) so I could get back to the hotel in time to check out and drive to the next location. It also meant that I had to be aware of what I was drinking the night before and couldn't exactly hit the town, but since I was doing pretty much all of the driving I didn't want to be driving in a foreign country on the "wrong" side of the road with a hangover! The exciting aspect was in the variety of the running. In one holiday I have run in the Yosemite and Sequoia national forests, up and down the Las Vegas Strip and across the Golden Gate Bridge. I got to see things that I didn't have a chance to when sightseeing.

Since landing back in the UK I have been following my running schedule closely. The difficulty has been trying to adjust to jet lag. On Tuesday I did not sleep at all overnight so just went out and did some speed work at 5:30 in the morning! I have noticed that as the week has gone on my heart rate is about 10 bpm more than it should be. I'm not sure if this is due to the jet lag, overtraining or just an anomaly. This morning I went for another 20 mile long run. It was a bit of a struggle to say the least. A number of issues conspired against me. Firstly I had a serious bout of insomnia last night (not jet lag related, just pure insomnia). Secondly I had plotted a route through Richmond Park. Richmond Park is beautiful and I saw lots of deer and parokeets but it is not at all flat. This pushed my heart rate right up and also meant I expended more energy than normal. I had to stop with 10k to go just to pop into a garage to buy some water. Now, I'm not sure if this is a continuation of the issues I noticed at the end of the last week or just a one-off based on the circumstances described. Anyhow, by the end of the run I was as shattered as I normally am after running a marathon. And this was at a slower pace. I am going to have to monitor how I feel during this week's training very closely indeed. If I think that I am overtraining then I will have to reduce my levels of training as well as reset my expectations for the marathon. I'm hoping it's a one-off!

On a more positive note I haven't gained any weight from being on holiday. So every cloud etc. etc.

Anyway here's my run from this morning, if you drill into it you can see how my heart rate shoots up quite significantly once I started climbing the hill to Richmond Park.

Marathon Training - Week 5

Only five days of running this week because the training schedule allowed for an extra rest day after last week's 10k race. Still managed to clock up 40 miles in total with a 15 mile long run this morning.

This week sees me jiggling with my training schedule to allow for my flying to the States on Friday. This means I am going to be doing my long run of 18 miles on the Friday morning. My next rest day will be next Sunday which means 8 days straight of running. Could be quite tough but at least I'm hoping it will make sure I fall asleep on the 11 hour flight to LA.

This week will also see me doing some hill training on Tuesday morning. It's probably the most boring of the training types but helps build strength and will be the biggest test of my calf muscles so far. It's held up well to all my training up to this point so I'm quietly confident, although this could be the very definition of hubris!

I've achieved my race weight of 78.3kg three months before the start of the race. I now need to reduce my body fat content by another 2%. Not sure how I'm going to do this without losing more weight. I may need to alter my diet further. To be honest though, travelling around the States for two weeks on holiday will probably see my weight go up more than down.

 

Here's my 15 mile long run from this morning. I ran a new route down the Grand Union Canal to Notting Hill and then ran back along the Uxbridge Road towards Ealing. I've looked at the breakdown of the stats and I managed to keep my heart rate under 140 bpm for the first 10 miles, then it moved significantly towards the 150 bpm range. I think this is due to not taking on any water or fuel. I'll take some running gels with me for my 18 mile run on Friday.

Marathon Training - Week 1

My first week of marathon training at last. Six days of running and 31 miles (sessions of 4,4,5,3,5 and 10 miles). Only fifteen more weeks to go!

I'm glad to have started training. I love running but I prefer having a focus, it's much harder to skip a session if I'm tired or just don't feel like it when you know that all the training goes to how I will perform come October.

My longest run this week was 10 miles this morning (Sunday). The weather forecast was for scorching hot weather so I got myself out of bed at 6:30am so I could beat the heat. I've bought a small, light-weight digital camera so I can take photos when I'm out on a run. It's not too difficult to run with it and when I'm finished I can slip it into my pocket. I took a couple of photos this morning down by the canal. They varied in quality but I didn't stop running to take any photos so had to rely on a bit of luck and hope that they didn't come out too fuzzy. This one was the best quality, it's not too bad if a little bit fuzzy:

My plan has been to cut out alcohol as much as possible except for special occasions such as weddings or fancy meals out. This hasn't been entirely successful. At the moment I'm not drinking during the week which is good but then I'm drinking normally on the weekend which is not so good. The main problem is drinking on the Saturday night before my long run on Sunday morning. Last night I drank a bottle and a half of red wine and then had to get up for a 10 mile run this morning! I managed a decent pace but as the long runs get longer I don't think this strategy can be maintained nor is it particularly helpful for getting up early! I think I will allow myself to drink normally on Friday and Sunday and then restrict myself to two glasses of wine (or equivalent) on the Saturday. The rest of the time I won't drink. Maybe nearer to race day I will actually stop altogether.

My wieght-loss is going well. This morning my weight dropped below 80kg for the first time in over a year. Next step is to get it down to about 78kg and maintain it. I was calorie counting but since I've started running 5 or 6 days a week I've not had to worry too much about it. If I see my weight creeping up again and I may have to rethink what I'm eating and drinking.

Here's my 10 mile run from this morning. My heart rate is higher than I'd like it to be but I think that's down to the extra alcohol!

The Running Man

17 miles this week! 5 days of running including two sessions of 4 miles. The only pain I've been feeling is the usual muscle aching that occurs from using muscles that I haven't used properly in the last six months. Next week I'm going to extend the long run sessions to 5 miles. This means I'm going to be able to travel further afield from my house than the usual running around in a circle.

I've been reading about what my optimal running weight and body fat is. Exciting stuff eh! Apparently my current body fat of 15.5% puts me in the 80th percentile for my age. If I reduce this to 12% it will put me close to the 90th percentile and would pretty much be my optimal body fat without giving up work and becoming a full time runner. My estimated weight for this body fat would be 78.3kg (12 stone 6 pounds in old money) which will become my goal in time for the Chester marathon in October. At the moment I'm 81.6kg so it shouldn't be too difficult providing I don't get injured!

Here's my weigh-in from 24th May:

Here's my run from Saturday morning, a nice little run to Ealing Common and back:

Speeding up the schedule

My recovery is going well so I'm going to speed up my return to full running by halving my training schedule. This just means that instead of doing two sessions of the same then I will only do one and then step up the amount of time I am running for the next session. This "should" allow me to start my marathon training at the end of June. If I feel any twinges then I'll step back to the previous session until the twinge goes away. Well, that's the plan at least.

My plan to lose 6 kg by the start of July is going well. I've lost just over 3 kg since the start of April so as long as I can keep off the pizzas and curries for the next six weeks then I should hit my goal. Hopefully by running more and more this should become easier.

I was ill at the start of the week with a cold which didn't help. I wasn't able to do my core exercises although I did go running. The rule of thumb is that as long as the cold is not in the chest then you can still run. My heart rate was up a bit but I managed to get all three sessions in.

Friday's run was a nice circular route that I used to do the first time I started running about ten years ago.