I'm very lucky in that I'm surrounded by lots of varied routes in Rathcoole. Depending on my mood I can do circuts, hill work, cross-country and road training.
I went out with Cooper (the dog) the other day and walked a number of new routes with a peadometer and now have (including two reached by a short drive) one 1.5 mile circut, two 2 mile circuts, a 3 mile circut and a 5 mile circut. On top of this I also have the option of the gym for some cross training and to break up the boredom of road running.
Now who'd believe it's only 26 weeks until the marathon. More importantly it's just over 11 weeks until the first race of my 3 race series, the Irish Runner 5 Mile Challenge on July 18 in the Phoenix Park. With this in mind I've taken on, after advice from my trainer, a new training program. It involves something I've never done (indeed never heard of) before called Fartlek Training.
Typcial Fartlek training consists of shorter training sessions made up of jogging, walking and fast running. For example by the time the 5 Mile race comes around I'll be doing 5 minutes of light jogging, 4 5 minutes cycles of 1 minute walking and 4 minutes fast (8/9 miles per hour) running and then finish up with 5 more minutes of light jogging. By the time the actual marathon comes around I will be doing double.
Therefore, from here until the 5 mile race, my training schedule will be as follows.
