#85 Carry That Weight

Despite not really having time for this (Teacher's College is A LOT of work! Not really hard work, but A LOT of it), I wanted to post a brief update to highlight what my training has looked like over the past two weeks, 10 and 11 of the 15 week marathon build to NYC.

In sum, they were intense!

It began the day after Oakville, which has since been re-measured and sure enough, found to be 316m long. That Monday featured an 'easy' 21.1k (a true half-marathon) followed by a 30k double (10k am, 20k pm) on Tuesday, 21.1k on Wed (including intervals of 3.2k, 800m, 2.4k and 800m @3:15-3:25/k) AND another 21.1k on Thursday and then a double (10k am, 21.1k pm) on Friday. Saturday was an easy 11k before the long run on Sunday which totalled 33k but was unfortunately disjointed and consisted of several mini-runs over the course of 3 or so hours. Nevertheless, the weekly total was 168km (104 miles).

Running at home along country roads featuring fantastic Fall colours.

Week 11 was always going to be tough given that it was planned as the highest volume week of the entire program. Coach Campbell aptly named it the "Fat Bastard" and the whole crew was feeling ready to take it on. In short it went like this: 17k on Mon; 34k (12k am, 22k pm) on Tues; 20k on Wed (including 9x90sec hills @HMP); 30k (12k am, 18k pm) on both Thurs and Friday (60k total); a 36k long run on Saturday due to a tight travel schedule for Thanksgiving and which featured tough pick-ups of 1,2,12,1,3,6min on rolling country roads; and then a final 15k on Sunday to top off the week which totalled an insane 182km (113m)! This was the fourth (and final) 100+ mile week of the program for me and I have to say that it felt pretty damn good the whole time. However, I was much looking forward to the current week which would see a short 'mini-taper' for the Scotiabank Half.

This week (week 12) has so far started off high with 18k on Monday, 30k on Tuesday (12k am, 18k pm) and 25k on Wed including perhaps the most challenging workout of the season (5 intervals of 2k, 2k, 3.2k, 2k and 2k @3:20-3:30/k) which we nailed in tough conditions. Many thanks to DC and MDF for pushing and pulling me through this one.

Since I'll be racing the Half on Sunday (the current weather forecast is NOT looking good... 50kph winds), I began my 'mini-taper' by running 15k on Thurs, will run 12k on Fri and will take Saturday completely off (only the 9th day of no running in 20 weeks/140 days). The weekly total will 'only' hit about 120k but is well deserved after the two weeks prior. Following the race, there will still be 3 weeks left to go until NYC but the unofficial taper will then begin with weekly totals of ~140k, 120k and 100k (including the race). Check back shortly for a Scotiabank race report where I feel I am ready to run a sub 1:15 (weather permitting).