Day 36 - Listen to your body

Today, day 36 is a rest day. Yesterday, day 35 was not but it was a missed training day.

Last week I felt a slight twinge in my lower left leg, this was on the way to bed and thought little of it. I duly went on a 75 minute hard training run the following morning. I then spent the rest of the day on the internet trying to figure out what I had done to myself as it was painful to walk.

After much reading, I deduced that I've pulled my Achilles tendon (slightly, luckily). So for the last 3 days i've been very gentle on it so as not to aggravate it any more and hopefully let it recover quickly.

By the way things are going, if I don't have any set backs before tomorrow, i'll head to the pool to keep the exercise up but I will definitely hold back from any more running until at least this coming weekend. I knew there would be occasions when training days got missed due to work and life generally but I wasn't expecting it due to injury.

I think I've fallen into the 'over training' category where my body has not had sufficient time to recover in all the ways it needs to.

But for me, this whole Marathon event is a learning exercise. I just hope that the lessons learned are not to severe.

Day 28 - Marathon is easy, getting out of bed is harder

The title of this post a little tongue in cheek because clearly running a marathon is not anything like easy. But on mornings like today, after a long week, you're rudely woken up early on a Sunday by an alarm clock only to remember that you have to dig yourself out of your comfy bed and go and run 10 miles in the cold blustery wind.

7am, it's still dark and looking out of the bedroom window you can see trees blowing severely in the wind, this can only result in one thought - "i'm going back to bed".

So for anyone who has had this moment while training in the past, I really do sympathise and it comes down to determination to step away from the bed and head for the door. Obviously after dressing appropriately for the job at hand.

Eventually after a couple of miles warming up I had a solid run. 10 miles round and I felt good when I had done. I can't say that I look forward to another 14 weeks of similar moments, but there is a goal and if I accomplish it then this will all be part of 'My Story'.

Day 25 - Terrific run today

The plan today said 70 minutes at Marathon pace. Seems a reasonable thing. I set out and immediately found my Garmin screaming at me to slow down.

I proceeded to carry on for the next hour with it continuously telling me the same and as much as I consciously tried to slow down, as soon as I went onto autopilot and got in the grove again the pace went up.

So in the end I did a whole mile further than expected and had pace times which were 30-45 seconds a mile quicker than I should have done.

I'm sure this was not the greatest move on my part and I guess if I carried on doing this then it would fall into the category of 'over training'.

Day 24 - Rest day, so let's reflect

No outside fun and games today so I have some time to think about all the other things which shouldn't be forgotten in planning for a marathon.

The training plan is now properly set-up and I won't miss read it in future. I 've added it to the web page too.

What about nutrition? Am I eating the right food? Am i eating the right food at the right time? Am I eating the right amount of the right food?

The books about Marathon running, which I own, fall fairly short in the nutrition chapters. They give indications of the type of food to eat (Cereal, Bread, Pasta) and rough quantities e.g. 60% Carb, 25% protein and 15% fat.

That's all well and good and other resources list more about your weight and trying to quantify the intake as a percentage of body weight. But this is all wide of the mark. So I weigh 64 kilos that means I need X grams of carb per day, but today is a rest day. What about tomorrow? I'll be burning an extra 700 calories in my training run, how do you quantify that?

If I try and work it out then I would conclude that I need to replace 420 calories in carbs, 175 in protein and 105 in fats. So from here I need to work out what food i'll be eating, let's say bread for example, calculate the nutritional value of the bread and eat so many slices to cover the 420 calories, on top of my normal daily intake.

But is this correct? If I do a long, slow run, running in my aerobic window and this formula above above is right, what happens when I do an anaerobic training session or a VO2 max session? does the one formula fit all?

I spent ages reading about the physiology of the body and learning about my body levels, heart rate, etc before I started, I haven't got enough time to do the same with nutrition.

Any nutritionists out there care to help? 

Day 23 - Garmin Rules!

Heavens it was cold this morning. Average of about 27F. with frost and ice everywhere but I set about putting in a 7 mile run.

When I got my Garmin Forerunner 610 late last year I was amazed how clever it was and then I was doubly amazed when seeing the result data on Garmin Connect. But it gets even better.

Up to now doing repetitive split times has always been awkward and so i've always gone to the gym as there's more technology to show me what's going on. Last night though I set up a custom workout (via Garmin Connect), which in fact only had 4 items on it and this set me up for:

* 1 Mile warmup at 10 min pace
* 40 minutes (20 reps) of:
   1 minute run at 7.30 pace
   1 minute recovery at 10:30 pace
*1 Mile cooldown

I sent this to my 610 and proceeded to do what the watch said i.e. 'speed up', 'slow down', etc, etc.

An hour later, one workout complete and all the results as you'd expect. As far as features go I think this watch is utterly amazing and in a sort of mad way i'm looking forward to the next 14 weeks of training to see what else this watch can do.

Day 21 - What happened to the weather?

Wow it was cold today. I gave myself a 7:30am start, expecting it to be chilly but when I looked out of the window and saw the frost covering and the outside thermometer registering -4C I was a bit shocked.

So, wrapped up warm including gloves (for the first time) and set out.

The technology of the clothes really is good as I can't say I was cold. A little cool to begin with but not cold. By the time I reached 4 miles my bottle of water was more like a slushy.

Cattle grids can be fun too, made of metal, frozen solid and covered in ice - tiptoed very carefully over 2 of these and then nearly came unstuck. A beautiful morning to be out though, no clouds and the sun came up.

Day 19.

Nothing too exciting to report today.

Cold and dry and I did my marathon paced run. All went without a hitch. It does look like the weather is heading into a seriously cold spell, so Sundays run might well call for gloves and an extra layer.

Day 16 - Spot the mistake

According to my last post on day 14, day 15 (Monday) was a rest day. Wrong! Tuesday should have been the rest day, so i've ended up messing the whole week up. Now, not that it'll make too much difference, i've re-jigged this week and i'll blend into the training plan properly next week (if i can read a plan by then).

I've also just checked the stats for my training so far and i've effectively run from Milton Keynes to Dover and I've burned off the equivalent of 27 big macs in doing so. I'm not measuring the loss of fluid but that would be considerable too.

My re-jig means that tomorrow IS a rest day and then back with it for Thursday and Friday. I am making this up as I go along.

Day 14 - Ouch and about

I couldn't believe it when I woke up on Sunday morning. Not only was it quite early but my knees, hips and numerous lower half muscles hurt.

These 2 things really made me just want to stay in bed but finally I got on with it.

I cannot work out why I hurt so much as it was 2 days since I was in the gym and I usually do 30 minutes swimming on a Saturday anyway and this Saturday had not been more intensive than any other.

Never the less I went out and did a medium distance relaxed (slow) run. Only 7 miles, which was perhaps just as well if parts of me needed more time to recover. At the end of it I can only describe it as invigorating as an hour or so afterward I felt like everything had loosened up and most of the aches and pains had gone. To describe it as a recovery run would be about right.

Monday (day 15) is rest day so another opportunity to give the joints/muscles time to recover. Tuesday (day 16) will mill merge into the training schedule properly. 

Day 12

5 miles of LT Training today.

6 minute warm up, 4 minute cool down and 35 minutes of 1 minute splits at 5.5/8.5mph.

Managed to keep under VO2 max quite well and felt good at the end.

Day 11 - Rest Day

Definitely a rest day in the end. Very strong blustery winds today with the occasional down pour. Doesn't hurt to have a truly restful day.

Day 10

Fast 5 miles today.

5 Mile Loop

Heart rate was not into VO2 max but I definitely pushed on at an unsustainable pace (well unsustainable for 26 miles at the moment anyway).

I don't mind saying that I was glad to reach the end.

I was also breaking in my new Saucony Omni 10 running shoes. I don't thing i've ever tried to break in any trainers in such an aggressive fashion before.

My knee held out OK but it's a little sore now. It's not something i'm too worried about yet but after resting tonight it may hurt tomorrow. We will see.

Rest day tomorrow so maybe out on the bike.

Day 9

30mph winds and driving rain suggested that today may be a day not to go out running.

It will give my knee another day to recover but it makes you conscious of the lost day. Every day counts.

Day 8

Another rest day really.

Seems that i've got runners knee which I think has been brought on by the distance i've covered in the last few months, that and my Saucony Omni's are coming to the end of there life, the absorption is going and the support too.

So i've spent some time today getting a new pair of the latest Omni10's.

The knee is not too bad today either, i've hardly noticed it since about 10am. Maybe the swim yesterday helped.

See how we are tomorrow and I may head for a short, fast 5-6 mile leg.

Day 7 - rest day

A nice way to spend New Years day. Resting.