Nerves are rising, mileage is dropping and I’m eating carbs carbs carbs, I guess this can only mean one thing: it’s TAPER TIME!
Monday I did a slow run from an hour and I’m planning to do the same tonight, Friday a small half hour and Saturday is game time!
6h of running a 2km lap and hoping I manage to do it at least 33 times!
Writing this down already makes my heart pound, hope Saturday I can keep the adrenaline to a minimum 🙂
In order to optimally prepare for my 6h race that’s coming up I felt I had to step up my game and run more distance per week.
Feeling comfortable with 100k a week was the goal to achieve, but never before having run 100k in one week, this was somewhat challenging.
For me it was a somewhat magical line, that’s why I want to share my experiences with you all.
Don’t go out as a madman and keep on running until you practically collapse so you only have to do three runs for making it to 100k.
There are seven days in a week and with the rule of thumb of ‘the long run = 1/3 of your total week’ you can even have a rest day (or two) if you plan properly.
I commuted by run to work and easily could go for a 20k a day without really tapping into my family time.
Afterwards being the week after.
Especially after breaking the barrier a first time you’ll feel tired. No problem, take a calm week and go back to your comfortable week distance.
Sort of covered this in the first point, but don’t go out and suddenly do a long run that’s double as long as your normal long run. Your system, joints, muscles just won’t take it…
70% of my runs were in my lowest heart rate zone (~60% max heart rate), the rest was one zone higher (~70% max HR).
I steered clear of intervals and high intensity for a while, because tomorrow and the day after and the day after … I needed to go running again 🙂
I cannot repeat this enough in all of my “advice” posts.
Listen to your body! Always!
Pain is bad, not just an annoyance.
It’s normal to feel stiff or sore, but pain (stabbing, constant, …) pain is a clear signal that you’re not ready yet.Trim down for a while and try again.
Once you’re at the point of 100k a week you should know that your body benefits from more than running alone.
Clean, healthy eating and a decent amount of sleep (~+1h per week for every 10km) is paramount if you run distances and as frequent as this.
This was my goal, feel comfortable running this much so it doesn’t feel like “having to”
At some point I ran 300k in three weeks and yes my body needed rest after that, but every day I went for “just another run”, which felt nice.
Did you break 100k a week? Was it as much planning for you as it was for me?
Or do you have another ‘mental barrier’ that you want to break in one week someday?
Hooray July! Welcome summer!
We’re halfway through 2015, so it’s time for an overview of my goals for 2015.
3 months ago my quarterly evaluation could be better so let’s see if it’s already better.
2 ultra distances 
Nope, not even one ultra yet.
At least, not in a race. Furthest training has been 46km, so technically I’ve done an ultra already, but I’d say it doesn’t count.
Next week will be my 6h race, so first one is definitely covered!
+2500km of running
I have not yet covered 2500km, but I am ahead of schedule, so I’m hopeful.
I should have done 1250km by now and already covered 1476km, which meant I’ve done a whopping 1020km since April 😮
Break distance record (currently ~57km)
Nay, let’s keep them fingers crossed for July 11
Break duration record (currently 5:51)
See above 🙂
Nice-to-haves:
I did the last one with Trail Du Mont and will do it again with Trail Des Fantomes in August.
Funny thing is that ‘PB on HM’ is not included above, but I did achieve this already this year...
So how are your Goals going for 2015? Will you make it or do they need some adjusting?
Pfiieeoouuuwww…
That was basically my feeling after my Saturday run.
The last 100k week before my 6h run July 11th and I’m not really sad about it.
I felt like I was reaching the verge of overtraining: Constant tired, not really feeling like running, massive hunger all the time, …
So it seems it’s not a week to early to end my heavy weeks.
Three weeks before my race and I plan on doing 2 weeks of 70k (both in 3 runs, so plenty of rest days) and the last week will be tapering (it’s a must ;-))
I have some nice runcommute pictures of last week I wanted to share with you to start this week.
So last week was my rest week.
I “only” ran three times for a total of 70k.
But somehow I feel like my body is catching up with my heavy weeks from before last.
Since April I’ve been building hard towards my 6h race and I feel like my training is really working, yet it’s starting to get heavy as well. But hey, you don’t get better by doing all easy runs…
So last week was:
This week I’m planning my last heavy 100k week, but I’m guarding my tiredness, so it could be my schedule gets changed during the week…
Right now I don’t feel my body can take another 40k run, so that one really hangs in the balance.
On the plus side, that would be my last +30k run before the race itself on July 11!
Are you planning ahead? Easy week? Heavy week?
Either way: loads of fun to you all 🙂
I’d like to offer a first evaluation of my time commuting on running shoes.
I was not properly organized, which meant I had to start with what I had “in stock” around my house.
So I took my 20l hiking backpack and packed it with all my clothes, towel, soap, shoes, lunchbox, …. Put on my running clothes and shoes and off I went.
First impression “this is awesome, I’m running to my work, FFFRREEEDOOOOM!”
Second impression “This backpack is not OK for running to my work”.
Second day I tried pushing everything in my trail backpack that holds my camelbak. Waaay to small.
So although running to work felt like a good idea, I soon realized that preparation is everything (isn’t it always…)
I bought a new backpack at Decathlon that was suited for long trailruns.
I think I’ll write-up a review some day for it, because it suits me pretty well for my needs.
The biggest plus about it, is that the band around the waist is with velcro. Why didn’t anyone think about this earlier!
Along with the new backpack I decided to leave an extra pair of shoes and one of my older jackets at work. I do not need these during my run and as I have a desk job, it’s ok it’s one of my older, more worn, jackets.
This way I could free up some space and my was my backpack more than big enough for my needs.
I also have a small towel with fast drying microfiber which is just big enough for a quick shower at work.
Then it’s just rolling everything neatly in a roll and start filling the backpack.
If you have any questions whatsoever I’ll be more than happy to answer them.
Hit me up in the comments or info@tellemaboutrunning.com
349k oh wow …
Best running month ever! No really, I do not talk about the feeling per se, but number-wise it’s definitely my best month ever!
I’ve picked up running around February 2013 and before May my maximum distance was 324km in September 2013.
Now I’ve not only broke my distance-in-one-month record, but I’ve managed to run +300km 2 months in a row.
You can imagine how happy (and tired ;-)) I am right now!
Chance is I’ll manager +300k in June as well, but a lot depends on how my body will cope with 3 weeks of heavy training (this week being 3 out of 3)
Have fun in June, I hope you all will see a lot of sun this month!
As I’m spending more and more time on blogs I sometimes find some really nice blog posts that I’d like to share with you all.
Most of them are running related, some of them are not…
Some posts
Why I Started Running part two
I’m just a sucker for origin stories 🙂
Grins For Life
Wings for life had to be covered this month and it’s an inspired post.
Running Pet Peeves
Yes, I too hate punching holes through my clothes every race again.
Some tweets
Enjoy your weekend!
As some of you might have noticed already in the right sidebar, my next race will be 11 July.
It will be a 6h run in Aalter on an official course of 2km measured by the IAU (Internation Association Of Ultrarunners)
Now that my heavy weeks are going well and I am confident (*knocks on wood*) that I will stay without injuries until then, I finally signed up officially.
I’m heavily training for this as I want to break my distance record (~56k) as my duration record (5:57) on this.
I reckon it will be somewhat mind numbing at some points, but I see it as a big training for my ultimate 100k goal. The mind needs training too.
So wish me luck in the last weeks to stay injury free and I hope to do a nice recap with a massive runner’s high the week after July 11 🙂
Last Saturday I set out to run a nice bike route near my home. It’s mostly flat and would lead through a forest, some suburbs, the countryside and canals.
As I’m training for a 6h run in July, I needed to add some extra distance to my long run. This route was 44k, so perfect!
As you all know, preparation is everything for running this kind of distance and durations, so I layed out everything I needed to make sure I had enough supplies.
The weather got me doubting what to wear but I settled for my Tribesports outfit.
The short sleeves could end up being a problem, but I took my chances.
The route started about 2 miles away from my doorstep, so I took the bike there. An extra 4 miles wasn’t exactly what I needed at this point and in the end it would give me the opportunity to ride the stiffness out at the way home.
At the start there was a nice sign with the entire route mapped on it, so after a quick snap of it for some aid (you never knew…) I set out.
The first 21k/13mi passed at a reasonable pace. I ran consistent (6min/km=9.65min/mile) which was the pace I hoped to average on in the end.
Combined with a heart rate between 130 & 135 I felt good and strong.
The route was changing enough and pretty enough to be interesting, which helps a lot on these looong runs.
After the first half I felt my energy sapping.
The plan was to eat a date every 2km and something stronger (chocolate, meli-koek, piece of gingerbread) every 8-9km, but I felt I needed to adjust this to every 5-6km or I would be drained way before the end.
At about 30-35k I felt everything getting harder and harder.
My hip joints were getting sore and my knees were getting more sensitive. The breathing and the muscles however were still cooperating very well.
This all changed at about 38k.
I hit the wall. It wasn’t a big wall, but it was a wall none the less. My emergency caramel gel were promptly put into my mouth along with some gingerbread and a good deal of water and after struggling about 15min I felt it got slightly better.
But the best was behind me… I already knew at about 35k I would end up doing more than 44k (I was back on familiar terrain) and the last 8k I was struggling.
Not that I was totally kaput, but my heart rate was consistently at about 140 and my pace had dropped almost 30s per km.
To add to my “luck” the weather started getting worse, wind started swelling and was in my face, I got into a rain shower (short one, about 5 minutes) and I because of this all, my arms were getting cold. (this may sound more dramatic than it was.)
But I just kept going and ended at about 46.5k.
I ended up eating/drinking:
The aftermath is great, yesterday I wasn’t all that sore, but I was tired.
Today the same, no soreness, but I could have used some more sleep… But tonight I’m aiming at another 20k, heavy week 2 out of 3 is starting!
PS: If you’re interested in live updates, you can always follow me on twitter…
How was your long run? Seen some nice things during?
Ever ran a layed out route (for bikers)?
