Training Log Archive: Badger

Event: London Marathon
 

A bit slower than the original target, but I think this was the best I could have achieved on the day given how I was feeling - so based on that I got the pacing spot on and absolutely delighted to get a PB by 10 seconds! - I thought a PB was going to be a few mins out of reach by half way, not feeling my best, but very pleased to keep pushing on strong throughout the second half, and really pushed it on the last few miles to just get the PB. Great day.

More detailed report now below...

Had a nice easy journey to the start on the 26.2 RRC coach from Surbiton straight to Blackheath, no need for any hassle with trains. Got there quite early at 8am so lots of time to kill, but I was feeling fairly good and relaxed, the Fast Good For Age start area was great and quiet with short toilet queues, and all feeling fine going into the start. It only took around 30 seconds to cross the start line, a great advantage of being in the front pen, and I was quickly running at roughly target pace and feeling fairly comfortable.

But there was a big contrast to Manchester and Abingdon – even being fairly close to the front end of the field where I was, it felt incredibly congested for a long time. Although I started easily enough at the right pace, and did the first 3-4 miles at around 2:52 target pace (6:33/miles), after the merging of the blue & red starts I was then finding it increasingly difficult to maintain the right pace because of being bunched in with a crowd which was a bit too slow (apparently the Red start set off over a minute later than the Blue start with lots of people saying it was much more congested than usual at this stage as a result). I don’t like weaving around because of the extra distance you have to run, but I had to do quite a bit of that to avoid being dragged along at too slow a pace for too long. The Garmin was already measuring a bit long, which I knew was due to the bits of weaving I’d been having to do, so I tried to focus more on following the blue line wherever possible.

The splits show that I did miles 5, 6 and 7 all at around 6:45 pace, quite a bit behind the original target. I knew I’d been slowing a bit – the congestion wasn’t helping, but I didn’t feel like I could push any harder without exerting too much energy and the doubts about what I could manage today started to appear. I was concerned that after doing the first 5km in 20:20 (bang on original target) I did the second 5km in around 20:45, and didn’t feel like I should try to speed up – I just had a general feeling that I wasn’t cruising along as comfortably as I would have wanted (especially compared to Abingdon where I felt like I was just floating round easily) and felt it wasn’t going to be the best day.

I quickly decided I should just try to hold the pace I was doing for now (around 2:54 PB pace) and not try to claw back to the original 2:52 pace target at least for now. In hindsight that was a very sensible move which ultimately got me the PB – my final time of 2:53:44 was equivalent to an average 5k split of 20:35, and I only managed this by settling into roughly that pace early on after it became clear how I was feeling. Once I’d accepted running at that pace it then became a bit easier and I started to enjoy it a bit more, taking in the atmosphere of the crowd and the iconic nature of the route – it was great going past Cutty Sark, then the first sight of my parents at mile 9, some other friends at mile 11, and I was just trying to get to half way with using the minimum amount of energy. Tower Bridge seemed to appear quite quickly, and I loved running across there – amazing atmosphere and wall of noise as I’d expected – and I was just pleased to just be happily holding the pace I’d settled into and feeling relatively comfortable now in doing so.

Onto half-way and the split time came up as 86:45 – somewhat behind my original 86:00 target, but still 13 seconds inside PB pace. But given how I was feeling a bit slower than expected, I really didn’t think I was going to be able to hold that pace for the whole of the second half, I was waiting for the inevitable fade to occur, and so thought a PB would be a very tall order at this stage – but I was at least determined to keep going as long as I could and try to get a decent time well under sub-3.

But I actually then picked up a bit after half way and had a few very strong miles, feeling very good at this stage. The crowds were still great, even going into the Isle of Dogs, and I didn’t find that section as hard as I’d remembered from before. I started to feel a little bit tired around the 18 mile point, struggled up a small slope to get up to the Canary Wharf section, but pushed through here as best I could knowing I’d soon see my parents again (which I did just before 30k) and had my third gel of the day (first caffeine one) which gave me a bit of a boost, and after a few slow miles at 18 & 19 I then really started to pick up again and was running strongly through 20.

I’d expected a tough final 6 miles, but the opposite occurred – I started feeling really good again, knowing I was on the long home straight, and started running really well – the amazing crowds in this section definitely helped. The calves were getting really tight by this stage, but I’d had no trouble from the niggling knee at all, so it was just a case of pushing through as best I could. I struggled a bit through the tunnel and up the slope at Blackfriars underpass at 24 miles, but once I was through this I knew it was flat all the way now, and tried to push on as well as I could. I also knew beforehand that 24 miles meant around 15 mins to go, and my time-check at this point put me exactly 15 mins short of my PB – it was going to be touch and go to get that, but it gave me the spur to really push on as best I could, though it was starting to hurt at this stage. But I felt like I was now on home terrain – I’ve run this stretch of road countless times during training – and knew exactly what was coming.

25 miles meant exactly 2km to go – and I was through in just under 2:46, so around 8 mins to finish get the PB, which meant I needed to do the final 2km at 4:00/km’s – this was going to be tight! But I was determined to keep pushing, and the legs somehow managed to keep going strongly, and I really had a new lease of life after turning at Big Ben. No more looking at the watch now, I just pushed and pushed as best I could, past the signs every 200m in the last km just trying as hard as possible, and finally round the corner into the Mall and a sprint for the line – and then absolute delight to finally cross the line and see I’d just snatched a PB by around 10 seconds!

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On reflection now there’s a bit of disappointment that after 4 months of hard training, with much more mileage than previously, I was only able to take 10 seconds off my Abingdon PB – though I would have been much more disappointed if I’d been more than 10 seconds slower and not achieved a PB (such fine margins can make all the difference). I did find it a slightly tougher race than Manchester or Abingdon – it was harder to follow the racing line so I ran a bit further (I reckon that added around 45 seconds), and there are a few more ups and downs – although the amazing crowd support probably helped a bit, especially towards the end.

So although I’d been hoping for around 2 mins quicker than this when I started the race (and until a month or two ago had been dreaming of around 4 mins quicker for a sub-2:50), it was very satisfying to manage a PB when I had pretty much given up hope of that before half-way and for most of the race thought that I wouldn’t manage it. I wasn’t feeling quite as fast on the day as I’d wanted to for whatever reason, but I was very pleased with the way I quickly adjusted my target given how I was feeling early on, settled in what seemed like a sensible pace, and then managed to hold that consistently for the whole rest of the race, pushing on really hard for the last few miles to get the PB. The overall pacing was remarkably even, with the second half just 13 seconds slower than the first half (much like Abingdon where I did the second half 20 seconds quicker), which of course meant that I was steadily passing streams of runners later on – the results stats say that in the last 7km I overtook 233 runners with only 7 passing me, which made it all feel so good!

It’s hard to know now what I could do to ever significantly improve on this time. Whilst I’d hoped I could knock a few minutes off the PB and do a 2:52, I suppose there wasn’t much hard evidence that this was in prospect, other than just thinking I’ll keep improving if I train harder (and my half marathon and 10km race times in the build-up to this were no better than previously). In hindsight the extra mileage may not have really helped, and perhaps I went too far and overdid it. Pretty much everything in the training program went to plan, other than a minor niggle and a few missed days near the end, and some harder sessions which didn’t go as well as I’d hoped – but I did at least do them all. I was very diligent in eating well again throughout the training, doing lots of core/flexibility/strength exercises throughout, and focusing as best I could on putting everything into the best possible marathon performance (within the constraints of everyday life and not neglecting work/family etc!). The weather and running conditions for the race were great, I couldn’t have asked for anything better and I wouldn’t have done anything differently on the day. There’s always the option of trying a slightly different style of training program trying to play more to my strengths – I certainly far prefer lots of long-slow distance runs to harder shorter interval/tempo work, but then maybe it’s the speed endurance work I dislike which I need to improve on to get any better! – and I find that very difficult.

But maybe I’ve pretty much hit the peak of what I’m realistically capable of in the marathon – I’m pleased to have proved that what felt like an unexpected breakthrough performance at Abingdon wasn’t a fluke, and a 2:53 marathon PB is much better than I ever thought possible a few years ago when I was chasing a sub-3 – so I think I’ll be perfectly happy if this is as good as it ever gets. And I’m very pleased to have banished the painful memories of the 15-minute positive split from London 2008, set a good new PB and had a great experience at what for me is the greatest marathon of them all.

And now it’s definitely time to relax, recuperate and over-indulge :)

Approx mile splits (proportionately adjusted to reflect small difference of Garmin finishing slightly over on 26.34 miles):
1-7 - 6:36, 6:30, 6:29, 6:28, 6:45, 6:44, 6:44
8-13 - 6:36, 6:37, 6:40, 6:36, 6:36, 6:41 (+ 0:43 to half way in 1:26:45)
14-20 - 6:29, 6:32, 6:37, 6:35, 6:44, 6:53, 6:36
21-26 - 6:38, 6:34, 6:42, 6:48, 6:34, 6:35 (+ 1:25 to finish in 2:53:44 – second half 1:26:59)

Official 5k splits:
20:19, 20:44, 20:36, 20:44, 20:22, 20:41, 20:48, 20:38, plus 8:57 to finish (20:20 5k pace).

Results - 1,119th out of 39,349

C • Nicely done 3

So that's the training completed - I'll have the usual pre-race rest day tomorrow, which seems to work well for me. I'm just praying the niggling knee holds out - I can still feel it's not quite right, but I think it's not really a major issue and I think I should just be able to ignore it and hope it won't get any worse or slow me down - I'm planning to go into the race assuming all is fine and hope for the best.

It's very hard to know how it's going to go on Sunday, and I always feel a little apprehensive at this stage. I've been waiting for 9 years to have another crack at London, after my first fairly disastrous effort in 2008 - that was my first sub-3 attempt, and I ended up with a 3:14 (after a 1:29 first half!) so I'm hoping it goes much better than that! Both of the marathons last year went so well, much better than I was expecting the day before, so I suppose I should be feeling relatively confident - but there's still the big unknown of what pace I'm actually capable of sustaining for the full distance.

Based on previous experience, realistically I reckon I'm in something between 2:50-2:55 shape now - probably somewhere in the middle of that, but not quite sure exactly where. So I want to give myself a chance of getting a time at the top end of that range if it all goes brilliantly well on the day, whilst not leaving myself open to detonation if I don't feel so good. So I'm sticking to the plan of a first half of around 1:26 or just under for the first half, which is 6:33/mile or 4:04/km, which means roughly 20:20 at each 5km split point. I'll reassess the position at half way depending on how I feel, which is exactly what I did last year in Manchester and Abingdon (where I sped up both times) - though if it all seems to be going ok I think I'll probably plan to stick to the same pace until I'm through the Isle of Dogs and Canary Wharf at around 20 miles and then see if I can push on from there.

It's been a very long journey to get to this stage, 5 years after first starting seriously focusing on the target of running a sub-3 and ultimately hoping to do so at London. I've done better than I expected in the last 2 marathons, and have upped the mileage by about 15% overall this time, as well as increasing training speeds a bit, in the hope to improve my performance even more. That's been a bit of a gamble, and not sure how well it will pay off, but (current niggle aside) I've coped relatively well with the
extra training - but I now await see what it translates to in terms of a performance. I know it's possible I may never get to this level again, so I've got to give it my best shot.

But most of all I want to enjoy the day and experience - it was a bit of a blur last time in London after such a painful second half - and I feel so much better prepared this time. A good performance and decent PB will certainly help with that, and I know it will still be a hard race if I'm to give it my all, but I'm really looking forward to it now - bring it on!

C • You have prepared so well P... 1

Hyde Park. Easy with a few strides.

Bushy Park. Nice and easy, even after a big carb-loaded breakfast.

Work to Hyde Park and back. Traditional session at 4 days out of 2 miles at marathon pace within an easy run. The knee was still niggling a bit, but not as much as the previous run 48 hours before. Other muscles still a bit sore after the needling yesterday, but I know that will ease off within the next day. The 2 miles at MP felt harder than I wanted at this stage and perhaps harder work than the equivalent session at previous marathons, but there's no point having doubts about the target pace at this stage - and the easy running bits felt very comfortable.

It felt good to run along the last 2 miles of the London route (in both each directions) - things will feel a little different when I get to that stage on Sunday!

Physio was very encouraging and positive - he could tell the right quad was particularly tight and knotted (maybe not surprising after all the build up of recent mileage). He did plenty of message and a hard acupuncture session on the quad (and calfs) - it's going to be a bit sore for the next 24 hours as usual but should then hopefully be in a reasonable shape and ready to race on Sunday. I'm sure it's not going to feel quite right on the race, but hopefully minor enough that I can ignore and push through any niggling feeling. In the meantime will do my last tapering runs over the rest of the week as planned, start carb-loading on Thursday morning as usual, and hope for the best!

C • Good luck 4