A gym session to start the day this morning; ten minutes on the cross trainer as a warm up followed by 30 push ups and work on the shoulders, biceps, triceps and abs.
I arrived at BBQ Stakes in time for a 2km warm up before Jen joined me for another 2km before the run started. I struggled with the hills today. They felt huge. I definitely slowed down!
Total distance of race: 6km
Time taken: 38:10 (I think that's the slowest this year)Average pace per km: 6:19
Total distance for day: 10km
After a light lunch and beaut coffee with Jen in Kingston I had a great remedial massage where he found all my sore spots - all good pain!
Thursday
Track session was not held tonight due to championship events over the weekend so instead I went for a fartlek session on rolling hills in the late afternoon. By then the sun was shining and it was surprisingly warm! I ran from home past the AIS and on to O'Connor Ridge. The trails and hills there are great. My fartlek session was as follows:
2 x 60secs fast/60secs float
4 x 30secs fast/30 secs float
2 x 60secs fast/60secs float
4 x 30secs fast/30secs float
2 x 60secs fast/60secs float
Then I ran back along the trails and on to the track past the AIS and on towards home.
Total distance: 13km
Strewth, for information, last Tuesday I did my last gym session before the ultra. I will still do some stretching but to do a real taper, the strength work has to stop fairly early on.
ReplyDeleteI agree Geoff. I don't do very tough strength sessions but I still cut them out 3 weeks before a marathon just because they add to cummulative tiredness and so I figure that to eliminate them adds to cummulative freshening up (that's the theory anyway!).
ReplyDeleteThe fartlek session you describe is one of my favourites Strewth although I add a 90sec effort and do it as a pyramid - ie, 1 X 90sec fast/90 sec float, 2 X 60sec fast/60sec float, 4 x 30sec fast/30 sec float and then back up to 1 x 90sec. That last 1 x 90 sec tells you you've worked :)
What are you running this weekend for you marathon prep? Hope all is going tip top :)
Hi Liz, Best of luck for the Ironman marathon run leg tomorrow. You will be amazing I know! Wow, you are so incredible running a marathon 3 weeks before a marathon! I ran 34.3km this morning and have the Vets handicap at Stromlo tomorrow. Yes, I enjoy that Fartlek too - challenging but always feels good afterwards!
DeleteTend to slightly disagree with the gym sessions. I've had a couple of slack weeks and will now get back into easy sessions of light but plenty of reps. My next run is same weekend as Canb marathon. What you don't want is upper body fatigue leading to a change in technique before the legs fatigue. Don't follow Speedygeoff's advice, he's the enemy in this challenge.
ReplyDeleteI've stopped gym sessions too - I don't want to embarrass Haviallah by doing twice as many chin-ups as she can.
ReplyDelete