P&D Spring Marathon Training Thread

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  • I'm in week 2 and nothing has fallen off yet....this is a significant improvement on last year.

  • North Runner - I have to use a GPS, I'm useless at gauging how fast i'm going, so for me my watch it an absolute must!

    I spent this weekend moving into my first house, which has been super tiring. Managed to squeeze in a semi long run Sunday, rec yesterday, and speedwork today.

    My 18 week plan starts on the 9th so I need to avoid decorating and fit in a solid 15-17m long run Sunday!

  • RamjetRamjet ✭✭✭

    Avoiding decorating is a life long strategy of mine.

  • 15West15West ✭✭✭

    and me. Actually I'm so crap at decorating it isn't even considered these days.

  • I am ok on that front my father in law is a retired painter and decorator Job Done.

  • DT19DT19 ✭✭✭

    I dont get involvd in that sort of thing. My wife has a far lower tolerance level for poor decoration than i do so she just does it!

  • Great! So I'll go by pace or heart rate for next LT run. Could do with an upgraded GPS watch to let me know when I'm on target too. 

    Another vote here for avoiding decorating. Mrs NSGNR also has a much lower tolerance than me for that kind of stuff, but she usually ends up roping in me to do much of the work! 

    Well done on the improvement yer maj.

  • Or even *roping me in - "roping in me" sounds so much more painful!

  • I've been doing some pace pieces on the treadmill, as I think it's the best way to keep a steady pace, something I haven't really got the knack yet when running outdoors.  But I may have to change that!

    It looks like I have picked up a knee injury. Woke up Friday with what felt like a bruised knew; it gave no problem at all on the long run, but just it still feels the same way, like a bruise more so when I get up after sitting. The only thing I've been doing differently is the pace runs on the treadmill. 

    So a few days rest, then tape it up for the next run and see how it goes. 

  • 15West15West ✭✭✭

    rest is the best cure Rachel....if hurts still when you go on your next run back off a bit...

  • 15West15West ✭✭✭

    also Rachel, if you are still building up your mileage to get your endurance up I wouldn't bother with speedwork, often people get injured when building up mileage and adding intervals, tempo runs etc. Best to do the endurance bit first.

  • Rachel - I agree with 15.  What I don't think P&D makes as clear as it might is that Lactate Threshold running counts for much more than its number of miles when compared to a recovery run.  Jack Daniels has a formula for this.  Too much speed work or racing leads to injuries, well it does for me!

  • DT19DT19 ✭✭✭

    As others have said Rachel running at hmp is pretty stressful on the body. Don't start the programme with an injury and carry it the whole. At this early stage let it fix.

    Am having to sqwueeze all my sessions this week into Monday to Friday as away all weekend. Did 17 this morning on tired legs having done threshold Monday and aerobic 9 on Tuesday. Thankfully came through that lot without injury and looking forward to some light bike recovery tomorrow.

    Looking at the SCH I see it kicks in properly with a 13 miler with 8 at mp next week. That seems unduly tough at this stage!!

  • RamjetRamjet ✭✭✭

    Yes the schedules don't seemed to be designed for people doing their first marathon as some of the distances include a MP section the first time you do them.

    When I did the 55 mile schedule in the summer I didn't come close to achieving the 16 with 10 @ MP but I did manage the pace on the later MP runs.

    Sadly the 26 miles @ MP seemed to be a step too far image

  • DT19DT19 ✭✭✭

    How did you select 'marathon pace' for training and what was your actual pace in end? 

    A lot of scherdules I have seen barely touch mp let alone 8 miles at week 2. The advanced schedule in the magazine peaks at week 9 with 16 miles with 2 x (4@mp then 4 slower than mp). That schedule now looks anything but advanced. 

    My outstanding question re mp running- do people judge whether they have hit it on a miler by mile basis or do you just reset the GPS etc and take average pace for the distance at mp? The latter seems more realistic. 

  • Mine is one of the older Garmins... Forerunner 205.  It can display average pace for the current lap, with a feature where it starts a new lap automatically once every X miles  (I set X=1... but you can do more or less than that).  So I can get an average pace that covers anything up to the last mile.  So... set out with a target pace in mind and try to keep that up... making mental adjustments to account for the terrain / uphill/downhill.

    You're never going to get it scientifically perfect. Just do your best.

    As for your comment about having 8miles at MP in week 2... it seems a bit severe to me.  Last time, I deviated from the programme in the early weeks, putting more emphasis slower miles.  This time, I'll hopefully have a better base to start from, so will do more MP work on those long runs... but not everything it asks for.

  • Thanks everyone. i've been doing speedwork across the summer for the half training, but never on a treadmill, it was a little more fluid outside. For this I was focusing more on having to do the sessions plus it's warmer inside!  I'm going back to outside sessions with more flexibility - not pushing as hard. Still resting, but definite improvement in knee.

    Nose: that's one of the things I'm working on, I've been using overall average pace for long runs, but after last weekend, where I had really slow miles due to shoppers, probably will switch to mile averages, so I don't push the later ones too hard to get the overall average correct.

  • RamjetRamjet ✭✭✭

    DT I think I worked MP out as HMP + 25. Otherwise McMillanrunning.com will tell you.

    I was aiming for 7:30 pace and after jogging the last 6miles ended up with 8:00 pace.

    I think it is ok to average the MP over the distance. In fact if your route contains hills this is probably essential.

  • 15West15West ✭✭✭

    The mp miles can be a killer...but I guess they're there for a reason. Like Ramjet early in the schedule I found them really tough to stick to the pace for that duration, but it did get (a bit) easier as got closer to race day. Going to be trying to run my mp miles at ~6.20min/mi image.

  • DT19DT19 ✭✭✭

    Yes, I was thinking of say getting to 5 miles in, resetting the watch for the remaining 8 and just maintaining the average pace.

    6.20 mara paceimage Thats my 10k pace. Oddly plus 25 secs on my hmp and mcmillan both come out at 7.03 mm for mara pace.

  • It never occurred to me to do anything other than keep my watch set to autolap at 1 mile and check the pace each mile - I keep an eye on current pace to make sure I'm not zooming off too fast after my warm-up (I have a default setting that goes 'right, time to run faster! Zooooooom!' and takes me up to 5k pace) and then just try and maintain a steady pace, with the mile splits telling me if I'm managing it or not.

    I've been doing 6 or 7 miles at MP as part of my training over the summer so 8 miles sounds like hard work but not impossible. We'll see when I come to do it. It'll probably be a little harder this year as last year's estimate of MP was based on my chosen target time, which was slower than I ended up running in the actual marathon.

  • 15West15West ✭✭✭

    I really need to work out how to use this autolap thing!

  • Another way to do it it is have your watch on manual lap and when the MP starts press the lap button then after the MP ends press the lap button again and then you should have that pace for the whole of the MP segment

  • I usually just record three separate runs when I do MP or speed session, or alternatively you could create a workout and upload it to the watch if it has that capability

  • DT19DT19 ✭✭✭

    I really need to just learn how to use my garmin as anything other than a glorified stop watch! Mine is automatically set to 1 mile auto lap which suits me 99% of the time.

    I think for me the best will be as what Stewart suggests. Run for 4 miles, reset watch and run 8 miles then reset watch and run 1 mile.

     

  • RamjetRamjet ✭✭✭

    I would just do what Lit suggests and look at your watch every so often to check your pace. If you are aiming for 7 Min/Mile pace then every quarter mile your time should be 1:45 mins on. I often do my speed work on a 1 mile loop and one of the advantages is that I know when to look at my watch.

  • I need to get myself reading... I've got Boston coming up next year and despite starting the book back in August I haven't progressed that far. All previous marathons have been trained for using garmin schedules from here on RW but I wanted to do a P&D one this time around.

    Hmm, if I read quickly I think I still have time before the training period begins.....

  • 15West15West ✭✭✭

    You don't need to read the whole book before starting out.

    The first chapter contains most of the important info about the different types of training sessions, the other chapters are all about recovery, nutrition, stretching, exercises etc...so these can be read at your leisure anytime. There is a chapter before the schedules which gives a summary of all the different workouts - same as first chapter but less scientific, that is useful...and then just choose the schedule you want and you're off!

     

  • Room for a slow one?

    Running Zurich in April as my first marathon. Aiming for sub 4 hours.

    Been running off and on for about 5 years now but it has very much in phases.

    I have a parkrun best (Mile End, surprisingly has a steep little hill in it which you go over 4 times!) of 23.5x from earlier this year which going by McMillan suggests a sub 4 should be possible.

    Training wise, I'm starting off using Higdon's Novice 2 as a basis to build mileage until mid Jan and then will launch myself into the 55 12 week plan from the book, albeit I may switch some recovery runs to swimming.

    I wanted to check if I am going about my pacing the right way though. Currently do two easy runs Tues and Thurs which I'm building from 3 to 5+miles, run at about 10.30-11 m/mile. Then a marathon pace run on Weds of about 5m of which 3m are actually at my 9ish m/m goal race pace.

    My long run (currently up to 10m so pretty pathetic, I'll get there though!) I try and follow what's suggested in the book, so start at MP+20% (about10.43 pace if I calculate it properly) then from halfway through move to MP+10% or 9.50.

    Do those paces make sense?

  • Welcome cleanshoes! Yes, those paces make sense if you are assuming your target marathon pace is around 9 m/m. My only hesitation would be calculating a goal time from a 5k time, as they're such different distances. It sounds like your plan to build up mileage gradually is very sensible, but I wonder if you'll have time to build the base needed to run McMillan's supposed 'equivalent' marathon to your 5k? On the other hand you might find your fitness improves loads with the extra work. It might be worth planning to do some longer races in between now and the marathon if you haven't done any recently, to check how your longer distances compare to your 5k.

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