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.
You should convert your running schedule from 'miles' to 'minutes' (You're probably around 8 or 9 mins/mile at the moment): otherwise you'll wreck your head thinking of 26 miles. After you do the 5-miler in July you'll have a clearer idea of your marathon objective.
ReplyDeleteFartlek = serious runner and hard man. Well done!
For comparison's sake, my Fartlek was:
1 min fast, 1 min slow ('fast' isn't a sprint)
2 mins fast, 2 mins slow,
3 mins fast... etc, up to 5 fast/5 slow.
Then, once you've more experience of it, do this and then go back down again to 1 fast/1 slow.
(Once I was feeling hard and I changed 'minutes' to 'laps of a football pitch': last fast lap I sprinted like a lunatic and was roaring my head off to get round. This was a Sunday morning in the Phoenix Park: even the flashers were freaked out. Life is good.)
I'm using the same schedule from http://www.sport-fitness-advisor.com/marathon-training-schedule.html
ReplyDeleteIt's 2 miles for me today. What has you Fartlek-ing so early?!