Saturday 18 April 2009

LONDON MARATHON, FINAL TEMPO RUN 6.14 PACE FOR 12 MILES


I was pleased to read this article the other day CLICK HERE TO TRAIN LIKE A 2.06 MARATHON RUNNER!
as it seems all my long tempo [ 11 - 18 miles] runs have been more than worthwhile, this afternoon I set out on my last long tempo before London, I was feeling a little tired after a very heavy night at work but at least the sun was out to make me feel better.
I ran my normal York rd, Trafalgar rd hill, hillside, Ainsdale and back along the coast rd loop, I got blown along by the wind at the start but had to fight the wind along the 2 1/2 mile exposed coast rd, it was hard work but I was kind of impressed with myself for powering along and holding pace!
Turning off the coast road I felt the effort in my legs and I used the downhill to recover a bit before moving onto a 3 mile loop.
10 miles went by in under 1.02 and now I finished off the run on a half mile loop near home, I hammered the straights and cruised the corners, soon I was almost on 12 miles and finished with a 11.7 mph final effort. JOB DONE!
My average pace would have given me a 1.21 half marathon but I'm sure in a race I might have been able to drop a couple of minutes!
Last year I could only manage 6.32 pace for a similar session!
12M, 6.14 PACE, 9.6 AV, 11.7 MAX, = 1.14,58

LONG TEMPO RUNS PROGRESSION;
Sat March 7th
12.23 miles, 9.4 av, 6.22 pace = 1.17.58
Wed March 18th
11.01 miles, 9.5 mph av, 6.19 pace = 1.09
Sat April 11th
18 miles, 9 mph av, 6.41 pace = 2.00 [ day after 4 mile race]
Sat April 18th
12m, 9.6 mph av, 6.14 pace, = 1.14.58
My other long hard runs were a 23 mile run with over 2,300 ft of climbing and a 20 mile race run at 6.18 pace.
I have done 9 steady runs of 20 miles or over and I have run many fartleck runs over 16 - 20 miles this year.
Just one more hard session on Tuesday, 8 x 400m then its easy, easy, rest!

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

You are in great form. Good luck for the race

RICK'S RUNNING said...

Thanks Canute

Ewen said...

You're going well Rick! Just keep your powder dry for the second half - don't "do a Thomas" ;)

RICK'S RUNNING said...

Thanks Ewen, I think my long tempo runs give me a good idea of the pace I can handle,about 6.25-6.27 pace, But I will try and relax and conserve my energy for the all important last 6!
I'm not sure what happened to Thomas, did he overreach or was it something else![his pulse rate graphs should give him a good idea!].

Ewen said...

Probably not enough training on downhills! The first 5 miles is downhill, so it hammers the quads no matter how slow or fast you run. Ryan Hall did lots of 'course specific' training - went out fast, handled the hills well and finished third.

Ewen said...

I'm thinking a good 'Boston' routine would be to find a course for your 20 miler where you run downhill for the first 5 miles! At least every few weeks.

RICK'S RUNNING said...

Thanks Ewen thats interesting stuff about the downhill! it seems quite a few quads got blown at Boston!
Ryan hall is one hell of a class act, I hope he wins one of the big marathons real soon!
cheers Rick