Less is More

God, how time flies. I’m already in the third week of my hills phase and the marathon is drawing ever closer. I do have to trust my training now, because there is no way to turn back and try something different. I’ve had good days and bad days; funnily enough, the good ones seemed to coincide with the days when I was running faster, while the bad ones were usually reserved for slower, recovery kind of days.

It was time for more leg punishment on Monday (love that phrase, so apt). I can tell how I’m getting stronger when I do the bounding. I used to be able to do these only for a few seconds at most, now I’m able to hold on for a good section of that hill, four times a row. The one thing that’s changed is the area of my legs that’s hurting during those exercise. It used to really eat into my calves and hamstrings, but they are fine now. What’s hurting now are what Ron Daws calls “the lifters”, the muscles near the hip and groin that lift your legs when you raise the knees high off the ground. I guess that’s down to me now being able to lift the knees higher than before, causing those muscles to work harder. I guess that’s the essence of these exercises, stronger muscles in those areas should automatically result in a stronger stride. Let’s hope the theory is correct.

I wasn’t sure how long I should run for today. Last week I did only a bit over 12 miles for the equivalent run and felt that I hadn’t worked much towards the end. I was also a bit concerned that I had only one run over 2 hours for the entire week, compared to 4 per week during the later stages of my base building phase. I bumped the mileage up to 15 for today’s run, but ran it easily, after all this is supposed to be a recovery effort between the hill workouts. I started out easily but was still surprised that the first two miles were slower than 9:00 pace. The weather didn’t help, it was raining and combined with the cold wind and the fact that I wasn’t warmed up yet made for some uncomfortable conditions. As always I managed to go faster once warmed up (and the rain had stopped) without increasing the effort. To be honest, I probably should have left it at 12 miles; by that time I’d had enough. The fact that I was running uphill, against the wind and the freezing cold rain at that point didn’t help, I suppose. If someone had offered me a lift home there and then I would have taken it, but not even the Irish would welcome a sweaty and soaked stranger into their car at this hour of the morning. It got better once I crested the hill (just an incline, really), the wind calmed down and the rain stopped, but the last miles were still dragging a bit. At least I got a great welcome, the twins were standing in the doorway, loudly celebrating the fact that Daddy had come back home. I was glad to be done with, but the heart rate for these runs keeps dropping steadily, which is definitely a good sign.

6 Aug: 4 hill repeats, 1:42:22, ~11 miles, avg. HR 141
7 Aug: 15 miles, 2:08:04, 8:32 pace, avg. HR 135