I am now only two weeks away from the Shamrock Marathon, and it is officially time to enter the tapering phase of my training. The past 12 weeks of training have gone incredibly well - probably even better than I could have ever hoped. I ran over 1200 miles, consistently hovering between 105 and 110 miles for the better part of the time. I dodged snow storms and arctic temperatures nearly every week, but managed to work around whatever Mother Nature threw at me.
Last weekend, I did my final long, marathon specific workout - 3 x 4 miles with a 1 mile recovery jog. Like many of my workouts this winter, I did not enter the workout with a specific pace in mind for the intervals. I have come to realize that I have surpassed by far, my own estimations of my capabilities as a runner. I have run some times in workouts this winter that I would scarcely have considered possible in the past, for instance, 3 x 2 mile in an average of 9:30. Going into that workout with the goal only being to run hard and consistent effort allowed me to run faster than I would have if I had started the workout with the goal being just to run 5:00 pace for example. I am a big believer that the body and the brain are capable of far more when you do not give yourself limitations. If you let it, your body will take you to the right pace.
For the workout last weekend, I mapped out a 4 mile loop with several small hills to make me work a little. I had a rough idea of the mile marks on the loop, but I wasn't too concerned about getting a split each mile. I was more concerned about running a hard, consistent effort each time. I finished the first interval and was taken aback by the time on the watch - 19:50. I was a little worried I had gone too fast on the first one and would ruin the rest of the workout. I turned out that the 19:50 had not been stretching my body a little too far, and I ran each of the next two in 19:45. It was an incredible workout and has left me with incredible confidence heading into the marathon.
From here on out to race day, I will be dropping my mileage considerably. This week should be in the 70-80 mile range and next week I will only be doing around 45 minutes of running a day getting ready for the race. All the hard work has already been done and there is not much I can accomplish in two weeks of training. Now, I just need to rest up and let my body absorb the pounding I have put it through for the past 12 weeks.
Training - Week of 2/24 - 3/2
Monday - OFF - This was the first day off I had taken since mid-January and it definitely came at the right time as I was coming off a very hard 20 mile run
Tuesday - 12 miles @ 6:10 pace w/ 0.5 miles of strides post run
Wednesday - AM run - 4.5 miles, PM run - 11 miles total - 3 mile warmup, 4 x mile, J 2:00 @ 4:42, 4:39, 4:39, 4:35, 2 x 800, J 2:00 @ 2:15, 2:08, 2 mile cooldown
Really a great workout! As I close out training, I will be starting to run some faster workouts just to sharpen up my legs.
Thursday - 13 miles @ 6:13 pace
Friday - 10 miles @ 5:55 pace
Saturday - 18 miles total - 2 mile warmup, 3 x 4 mile w/ 1 mile recovery @ 6:30 pace, 19:50, 19:45, 19:45, 2 mile cooldown
Sunday - 16 miles @ 6:00 pace
Total - 85 miles
