London Marathon Training: Week Two

​Week two of training saw the revelation that on Thursday it was in fact 100 days until the London Marathon itself. This sounded scarily close! I trust my training programme and the sixteen week approach I like to adopt for marathons, however there was still a little bubble of panic which rose inside me upon reading this!

MONDAY: from now on Mondays should always be a rest day according to my plan. For me they are always running rest days, but I still like to sneak into a Body Pump class at my gym!

TUESDAY: a muddly 4.5m interval run with lots of short, sharp reps. I find this type of training run a bit disjointed, especially as the evening darkness prevents me from running on my more favourable riverside track, which usually helps limit further interruptions such as road crossings. I ran my 12 x 200m intervals at 5k pace with 200m recovery periods in between, it felt hard but not as lung busting as some interval workouts can be.

WEDNESDAY: some seriously strong headwinds helped me slow my pace on a steady 5 mile loop. Why does the wind always seem to be blowing in your face when you are running uphill?! Body Pump afterwards

THURSDAY: 5 miles of tempo running, with the three middle miles between 8 min/mile and sub 8min/mile pace. It was bitterly cold out and I felt it took my legs a bit of time to get fully going, but when they did I enjoyed pushing the tempo pace.

FRIDAY: Rest Day

SATURDAY: a much more satisfying trip to Lincoln parkrun this week. I ran more positively; my body and mind felt in sync almost and I didn’t feel the need to keep glancing at my watch, which is always a good sign for me at parkrun. My time reflected an improved performance, back in the sub 22 minute zone with a time of 21:49. 

Moreover, it was also a great day for our Lincoln event as the record attendance number was beaten with a whopping 426 people completing their Saturday morning 5k – amazing! I then went for my third Body Pump stint of the week.
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SUNDAY:  on a soggy, grey morning I weaved a quiet 12 miles through the countryside (see image) – it seemed no one else dared brave the elements. Despite the minimal distractions I didn’t really keep my pace in check, and at first I ran a lot quicker than the suggested 9min/mile pace of my plan – at one point I logged an 8 minute/mile! In the end I reined my pace in a bit, finishing with an average of 8.37 min/miles. It was a solid base run, I felt satisfied after but not knackered. Next week mileage starts to creep up a little and I am definitely ready for the challenge. ​