This week has all gone pretty well! On Monday I decided to re-commence strength training. It has been a while since I’ve done any proper gym training but I feel that it’s an important part of running training. I incorporate strength training both to improve performance and prevent injury.
Strength training
My strength program is based on the article (Beattie, K, Carson, BP, Lyons, M, Rossiter, A & Kenny, IC 2016, ‘The Effect of Strength Training on Performance Indicators in Distance Runners’, Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research) – I can’t share it here but if you google it I’m sure you can find it.
The article outlines a pre-season strength training program which consists of two days a week, one day heavy and one day light/medium. And an in-season program which is one day a week. I plan on following the pre-season two days a week initially and switching to in-season once I get to more serious marathon training volume.
It’s always a bit tough getting back into weight training after not doing it for a while! After the first Monday session I was feeling the DOMS!
Stocking up
One thing I struggle a bit with is dinners! I don’t cook anywhere near as often as I should. The whole planning out meals, cooking, etc. is pretty time consuming and it hardly seems worth cooking a nice meal just for myself. So one of my favourite stores is Last Minute Chef who have a store near work. All they sell is frozen meals but unlike most supermarket frozen meals these are actually really good! Every so often I go in, buy a whole bunch of meals and fill my freezer!
Also this week I had some goodies arrive from Wiggle. When I saw I was able to get the adidas Sequence 9 for $72.. it was too good of a deal not to get! These are the latest model and I have seen them getting good reviews. One of the things I like to do in my spare time is read running shoe reviews! Also picked up a couple other things to qualify for free shipping… so a box full of 24 SIS Go Energy Bars (they were half price!) and some more GO Hydro tablets which I really like.
This week
Period: 13 Feb 2017 – 19 Feb 2017
For this week there were a couple increases – Tuesday’s session increased from 2 reps to 3 reps and Wednesday run increased from 8km to 10km. Also not planned but for my Sunday long run I ran for 80 minutes instead of the planned 70 minutes. I was running with the coach and got the OK to run a little longer than planned.
In terms of how training is going I think it’s going well enough. The pace for the reps and threshold is hard but I’m hitting my targets. Wednesday I went back to the physio who was happy with how my foot is going, the soreness I had has been reducing and I’m hardly noticing it all now. I had some more release done on the lateral side of my right leg and will go back in a few weeks time just to check in. I don’t think it’s a bad idea anyway to check in every so often with the physio during marathon training.
The physio had also recorded my running gait last time and had looked over it with a podiatrist since then. It was good to get feedback that they were happy and didn’t think I needed to make changes. I’m certain my running gait has plenty of room for improvement, but good to know there’s no major issue.
Running
| Day | Details |
|---|---|
| Mon | Rest |
| Tue | 2km warm up Drills and strides 3 x 2km @ 4.24 pace w/ 2 min rest (8.44, 8.48, 8.50) 2km cool down |
| Wed | 10km run (5.15 pace) |
| Thu | 2km warm up Drills and strides 4 x 800m in 3.10-15 w/ equal rest (3.09, 3.05, 3.11, 3.09) 2km cool down |
| Fri | Rest |
| Sat | 2km warm up (2.8km) Drills and strides 12 min threshold @ 4.24 (4.23 avg) 2km cool down |
| Sun | Long run 70 mins (You yangs 5.26 pace - ended up doing 80 mins instead) |
1%-ers
| Day | Details |
|---|---|
| Mon | Strength training (30 mins) |
| Tue | Foot/calf stuff and foam rolling (45 mins) |
| Wed | Physio check up and release on lateral side of right leg (30 mins) Strength training (25 mins) |
| Thu | Foam rolling (30 mins) |
| Fri | |
| Sat | Quick post run stretches (5 mins) |
| Sun | Foam rolling (50 mins) |
Summary
| Week | Phase | Runs | Km | Hrs | TSS | Fitness | Fatigue | Form |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 36 | MARATHON | 4 | 59.2 | 5:17 | 426 | 61 | 73 ↑ | 23 ↑ |
| 35 | Taper | 4 | 41 | 3:32 | 314 | 61 ↓ | 55 ↓ | -1 ↓ |
| 34 | Marathon | 4 | 62.1 | 5:26 | 450 | 64 | 76 ↓ | 6 ↑ |
| 33 | Marathon | 4 | 63.4 | 5:34 | 467 | 64 ↑ | 82 | 2 ↓ |
| 32 | Marathon | 5 | 70.7 | 6:23 | 502 | 63 ↑ | 82 ↑ | 7 ↓ |
| 31 | Marathon | 4 | 48.4 | 4:13 | 367 | 61 ↑ | 68 ↓ | 8 ↑ |
| 30 | Marathon | 4 | 63.9 | 5:43 | 462.1 | 62.7 ↑ | 78.3 ↑ | 4.0 ↑ |
| 29 | Marathon / recovery | 4 | 58.4 | 5:06 | 426.2 | 61.8 ↑ | 77.3 ↓ | -0.6 ↓ |
| 28 | Marathon | 4 | 66.5 | 6:06 | 486.1 | 61.6 ↑ | 82.5 ↑ | 3.6 ↑ |
| 27 | Marathon | 4 | 66.5 | 5:50 | 482.1 | 60.1 ↑ | 79 ↑ | 0.5 ↓ |
| 26 | Recovery | 4 | 54.3 | 4:54 | 386.3 | 58.1 ↓ | 69.5 ↓ | 3.5 ↑ |
| 25 | Build | 5 | 64.9 | 5:51 | 454.6 | 58.3 ↑ | 72.0 ↑ | -2.3 ↓ |
| 24 | Build | 5 | 64.5 | 5:41 | 482.6 | 56.8 ↑ | 64.6 ↑ | 3.1 ↓ |
| 23 | Build | 4 | 46.9 | 4:07 | 340.5 | 54.9 ↓ | 51.8 ↓ | 7.3 ↓ |
| 22 | Build | 4 | 43.6 | 3:55 | 307.3 | 55.9 ↓ | 52.1 ↓ | 11.1 ↓ |
| 21 | Half Marathon | 4 | 41.8 | 3:31 | 311.1 | 58.0 ↓ | 55.0 ↑ | 20.5 ↑ |
| 20 | Taper for HM | 4 | 37.5 | 3:10 | 304.9 | 60.1 ↓ | 52.4 ↓ | 14.6 ↑ |
| 19 | Recovery | 3 | 41.6 | 3:39 | 302.6 | 63.0 ↓ | 59.8 ↓ | 10.5 ↑ |
| 18 | Half / Marathon | 5 | 71.8 | 6:03 | 541.4 | 66.6 ↑ | 86.0 ↑ | -7.4 ↓ |
| 17 | Half / Marathon | 4 | 66.5 | 5:47 | 490.2 | 64.3 ↑ | 79.7 ↑ | -3.2 ↑ |
| 16 | Half / Marathon | 5 | 64.4 | 5:32 | 479.2 | 62.9 ↑ | 76.0 ↓ | -7.7 ↑ |
| 15 | Half / Marathon | 5 | 71.4 | 6:09 | 527.1 | 61.7 ↑ | 77.8 ↑ | -7.8 ↓ |
| 14 | Speed / Half | 5 | 63.8 | 5:38 | 460.2 | 59.0 ↑ | 70.3 ↑ | -1.0 ↓ |
| 13 | Speed / Half | 5 | 59.1 | 5:20 | 419.4 | 57.5 ↑ | 60.9 ↑ | -3.7 ↓ |
| 12 | Recovery | 4 | 39.1 | 3:21 | 288.2 | 56.9 ↓ | 54.8 ↓ | 6.5 ↑ |
| 11 | Speed | 5 | 59.1 | 5:14 | 421.8 | 59.6 ↑ | 70.4 ↓ | 1.7 ↑ |
| 10 | Speed | 5 | 61.6 | 5:23 | 460.3 | 59.3 ↑ | 71.8 ↑ | -1.9 ↓ |
| 9 | Speed | 5 | 58.0 | 5:06 | 436.1 | 57.9 ↑ | 67.8 ↑ | 3.4 ↑ |
| 8 | Recovery | 5 | 49.7 | 4:18 | 395.8 | 56.8 | 61.5 ↓ | -1.3 ↓ |
| 7 | Base | 5 | 54.2 | 4:44 | 417.0 | 56.8 ↑ | 64.4 ↑ | 2.3 ↑ |
| 6 | Base | 5 | 51.3 | 4:33 | 392.3 | 56.1 ↑ | 61.0 ↓ | 1.5 ↓ |
| 5 | Base | 5 | 52.5 | 4:32 | 421.5 | 55.9 ↑ | 61.7 ↑ | 2.2 ↓ |
| 4 | Recovery | 5 | 46.5 | 4:03 | 353.7 | 55.0 ↓ | 54.5 ↓ | 4.4 ↑ |
| 3 | Base | 5 | 50.4 | 4:22 | 381.7 | 55.7 ↓ | 57.1 ↓ | 1.2 ↓ |
| 2 | Base | 5 | 50.2 | 4:23 | 381.2 | 55.9 ↓ | 57.4 ↑ | 5.9 ↓ |
| 1 | Base | 5 | 43.9 | 3:52 | 334.3 | 56.0 | 53.4 | 8.3 |
Great photo of the rainbow. I am sure the pot of gold was just behind the trees. You looked like you were doing the run very easy this morning – I could not keep up your pace, and I only managed 1 hour. I think I may need to invite you over for tea so you are not surviving on frozen meals!!!
It wasn’t easy up the hill!! But after that I felt great.. the second half of the run I had a good rhythm going, comfortable running. Don’t worry it won’t take long until you’re back keeping up! Haha they’re good frozen meals though and I cook sometimes.. 🙂