3 little letters
Today I did something I said I wan't going to do. I printed off the RW sub 3:45 training plan.
I don't know what to do about my target for Edinburgh at the moment. It's no use pretending to myself that I don't want to get under 3:45 eventually. That's always been a long term goal. I was happy to put it off for a while, to let myself get more accustomed to marathons, but I know I want to shoot for it at some point.
BUT. I'm running well at the moment. Everyone at running club says I'm on fire. Not just from my times in races, but how I look when I'm running, my rapid improvement. I know that based on my recent form I should be capable of getting under 3:45 if I put the right training in. I also know that with just under 9 weeks to go, I still have at least a month to really make my training count.
I don't want to put too much pressure on myself, and I'm happier making a tentative decision now, having seen how the first part of training has gone, but part of me wants to seize the moment. Yes, I could leave it for Amsterdam, but I might not be in as good form then, or I might get injured. (And, despite my "there's no hurry mantra", Amsterdam would only give me a GFA time for 2009, not 2008).
Mainly I wanted to look at it to see how far off I am. If following the 3:45 programme would be a massive step up on what I'm doing, I'm not sure that I'd want to do it. If the 3:45 programme is pretty much what I'm doing, that's a confidence booster. If it just requires me to make small tweaks to my plan, then maybe I'd be prepared to make them. I'm not planning to follow it slavishly, but I wanted to look at how it builds you up, how far it has you running, how fast.
And I was pretty reassured. It wants you to get to an eventual standard of a sub 1:45 half - done. It suggests 20 mile runs in 3 hours 10 minutes - done. The weekly mileage seems to be roughly in the 35 - 40 mile range - done. There seems to be a bit more emphasis on speed sessions than I'm currently doing, but other than that my self-written plan doesn't seem to be too far off the mark. In fact, I could even be a week or two ahead at this stage.
This doesn't mean I'll make 3:45, but I'm feeling happier that it's possible if everything goes right on the day (see Berlin for things that might not go right...). I don't want to lose sight of the fact that I don't need to aim so high so soon, and that something around 4:15 would still be a big PB, and a big achievement. But if I don't at least try I'll always wonder what would have happened.
I don't know what to do about my target for Edinburgh at the moment. It's no use pretending to myself that I don't want to get under 3:45 eventually. That's always been a long term goal. I was happy to put it off for a while, to let myself get more accustomed to marathons, but I know I want to shoot for it at some point.
BUT. I'm running well at the moment. Everyone at running club says I'm on fire. Not just from my times in races, but how I look when I'm running, my rapid improvement. I know that based on my recent form I should be capable of getting under 3:45 if I put the right training in. I also know that with just under 9 weeks to go, I still have at least a month to really make my training count.
I don't want to put too much pressure on myself, and I'm happier making a tentative decision now, having seen how the first part of training has gone, but part of me wants to seize the moment. Yes, I could leave it for Amsterdam, but I might not be in as good form then, or I might get injured. (And, despite my "there's no hurry mantra", Amsterdam would only give me a GFA time for 2009, not 2008).
Mainly I wanted to look at it to see how far off I am. If following the 3:45 programme would be a massive step up on what I'm doing, I'm not sure that I'd want to do it. If the 3:45 programme is pretty much what I'm doing, that's a confidence booster. If it just requires me to make small tweaks to my plan, then maybe I'd be prepared to make them. I'm not planning to follow it slavishly, but I wanted to look at how it builds you up, how far it has you running, how fast.
And I was pretty reassured. It wants you to get to an eventual standard of a sub 1:45 half - done. It suggests 20 mile runs in 3 hours 10 minutes - done. The weekly mileage seems to be roughly in the 35 - 40 mile range - done. There seems to be a bit more emphasis on speed sessions than I'm currently doing, but other than that my self-written plan doesn't seem to be too far off the mark. In fact, I could even be a week or two ahead at this stage.
This doesn't mean I'll make 3:45, but I'm feeling happier that it's possible if everything goes right on the day (see Berlin for things that might not go right...). I don't want to lose sight of the fact that I don't need to aim so high so soon, and that something around 4:15 would still be a big PB, and a big achievement. But if I don't at least try I'll always wonder what would have happened.
posted by YP at 8:04 PM
1 Comments:
I KNOW you can do sub 3:45. You are a super-star. You can totally do it. Yes indeedy!
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