Day 1 of training for The Illinois Marathon is in the books. Got the plan from D today! Well, I got the month of January, that is. He said we'll evaluate and take it from there at the end of the month.
So I look at what he's got for me, and this week it's all easy stuff, with some 400's thrown in on Saturday. Looking at the weeks ahead, it's 4 easy runs and 2 runs with speed stuff in them each week. One day off. I can do this. I did this for the fall races.
Then I look at the top of the page, where he listed the paces.
Easy = 10 mpm
400's = 1:50
marathon pace = 8:35
Um, what?! I'm going to skip commenting on the marathon pace. I'll reserve judgement on that for now. But looking at that easy pace, I think I actually let out a "Wha???!!!" right there in front of him. 10 mpm seems so slow to me right now. I know it makes sense, and I know D knows his stuff. And I followed his plan and did really well in the fall, so I'll follow it again. But I've been running an easy pace of about about 9:30 - 9:40's and 10 mpm seems sooooo slow.
But that's what he said, so that's what I'm doing. That's what I ran today. 5 miles in just under 50 minutes. I ended up with a 9:52 pace. I feel like D would say that's ok. I hope he would. It was tough to slow down more than that. My legs felt a little heavy, even. But, I did it.
And I'm looking forward to the rest of the workouts, too. Even the one at the end of the month that D warned me would be hard. He even offered to have "one of us" (meaning him, or one of the store guys, etc) run with me for it. It's 2 mile repeats. Fast.
I'm looking forward to the challenge.
4 comments:
I think of easy pace as anywhere from 45 to 90 seconds over marathon pace and recovery pace even slower. So, those numbers look good to me. Sometimes it's difficult to truly run easy but it's just as important as running hard during the speed work, in my opinion.
I'm excited to see how your training cycle goes for you, you are really getting strong and I'm certain you'll have an awesome marathon!!
Yeah!!! Looks like a great plan. I agree with what Jen said on the pacing.
My paces are pretty much the same as yours.
What's your weekly mileage total like under the plan and are you doing anything else, i.e. core, cross, weights?
It'll be fun to virtually train with you and Maria!
Coach also has me running everything easy, since late Oct... that range is 9:12-10:12. It takes a smidge of adjusting but once you're dialed in it's all good!
did you do it on the TM or on the road?
Was it difficult to pull back?
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