Running

If I look at two recent races, which were under very unfavorable circumstances (flu vaccination, partial recovery from previous race) common sense tells me to go for a marathon in four hours, however, my average pace and heart rate tells me to go for 3h:45'. I need a coach! 🏃‍♂️

After my corona vaccination 1.5 weeks ago, I had a dip in my weekly mileage. GPs advice, so I’ve found through online search, for kids after their vaccination is against any intensive sports. I missed that, and now know why I felt so bad during my training in the last 10 days🏃‍♂️

Contemplating what to do with athletes who want to compete recreational in marathons, triathlons and ultras, yet don’t get the support they pay their T&F club a fee for. I suppose they better look for a personal coach, since we’ve been without a coach for many years now 🏃‍♂️

Yesterday our small scale running race (165 🏃‍♀️🏃, well-organized, 2x per year) around Nijkerk, the Netherlands, was accompanied by fanfare, courtesy of Concordia Nijkerkerveen. They were nice enough to walk us from the parking lot to the start, a few hundreds meters away.

I perhaps should mention that last Sunday I kinda ruined my half marathon race, yet got a boost in comfidence by outdoing myself with short bursts of speed during the race. With proper training I could see myself beating my PR set 20 years ago in my 40s, proving 60 isn’t old 🏃

Tomorrow I’ll be attempting to run 🏃 my long run not only on the usual empty stomach and only tap water, but also on slightly depleted glycogen stores, trying to “touch the wall on purpose”, deal with it while running. So today I’ll be fasting, doing the reverse of CH stacking.

Work (currently) in Progress 🏃 First long run in my current marathon schedule, a 3+ hour run.

See my Strava activity.

This morning I fell during a forest 🏃 Something I “luck” 😣 into more often than I’d like. So what does one do? Well, it’s silly to try and resist gravity, unless you’re able to jump over the moon. No, you give in, rolling over the ground, making a mess of yourself. No blood, yay!

This morning I had a resting heart rate of 42 beats per minute, the lowest measured in my life so far. I know running buddies who (claim to) have a HRrest as low as 34 bpm. Yay for supercompensation, the superior form of adaptation in sports physiology 🏃🩺

Preparing for a 10 km race this afternoon, 15.00 hours local time (CEST). With faster shoes and 3 kg weight loss I should be able to beat the 50:02 I ran six weeks ago, though it’s 5℃ warmer today 🏃‍♂️

Wish me luck, please, TIA!

Tried the new HOKA ONE ONE Carbon X 3 running shoe🏃‍♂️ ‘Twas an instabuy.

Aaand, I got a discount on an already low price. It’s not the Nike Alphafly super shoe, but more affordable and still awesome for a slowpoke like me.

On my long run this morning I saw the heather in bloom 🏃‍♂️🌸

I’ll be running in summer heat this afternoon, around 31℃ (88℉), so—aside from water—having a route for a 10 miles long easy pace run would be handy, especially if it’s uploaded to my Garmin watch 🏃‍♂️

It seems that running 🏃 in the heat improves running performance, even in colder weather, provided the runner is able to deal with performing in high temperatures. Since 30+℃ (86+ ℉) temperatures are expected coming Saturday, it makes sense to train under those conditions, right?

Yesterday I ran 🏃 21 km as a workout, alternating between marathon pace and 20 percent slower than MP. I expected to be extremely tired the day after, but I am not. Today’s a rest day, though I feel I could run. It’s a good feeling 😊 Rest is important, though, crucial even.

Yesterday I did my first training run of 18 km, on unfamiliar terrain. I expected to be super tired when I woke up this morning, but I felt great, and my resting heart rate was not elevated. Unlike previous times, my first week of marathon training went extremely well 🏃

I think where I went wrong every time in my marathon preparation is by training too hard. One shouldn’t be exhausted after a few weeks. Every session should be doable, tough at times, never too tough. Around races longer than 15 km should be ten days of easy going, and so on 🏃

Yesterday evening I did my first marathon training session, a 16 km aerobic pace run. Since I ran alone, I could pick my own route, so I made it a pretty route. I wasn’t fully recovered from the 12 km race 3 days earlier, so it felt harder than it should’ve 🏃

I ran a partial (4 of 12 km) trail (see Strava) in 23℃ (73 F) in 1 hour and 3½ minutes. It felt good and could mean a 4:09 hours marathon result in optimal conditions. I have still 5 months and a lot of training to go to possibly beat my marathon PR from 2004 (3:45 hours) 🏃

Sooo, I ran 21.1 km in 2:35 hours on saturday, and 21.1 km in 2:07 hours on sunday. I guess that’s 42.2 km in 4:42 hours. Fun fact, the 2nd half marathon was a race, and I ran the last 5.1 km 15 s/km faster than 2 hours half marathon pace😅 End-of-the-year marathon, here I come! 🏃