William Jenks' micro thread (help on Wed if possible!)
Patrick-
As a reminder, I am racing KS 70.3 on June 9 (A race), and then trying to qualify for Boston at Grandma's marathon on June 22. I ran a fast 13.1 just under 90 min and an easy one in just under 95 min in recent weeks. The time standard for Boston for my age group is 3:25. I've done two 20-21 mile runs on Thursdays in the last 3 weeks, both at around 7:40 pace. My official MP is around 7:00, but given the circumstances of my marathon (and trying to maintain bike strength during this pseudo-marathon buildup), I've been thinking that I'd target around 7:30 pace for the marathon, knowing I could easily slip to 7:40 and still have several minutes margin over the BQ standard.
Life circumstances (terrible weather [freezing weather in April, floods, thunderstorms, snow in May...], in-laws, son's HS graduation, etc) have meant that I've had to hack the training plan more than I would like, but I'm feeling prepared. E.g., this past weekend we had all-day thunderstorms every day except for my son's graduation, house guests, and then his party..... so my last RR ride morphed into a 2-hour workday ride yesterday, but at a full 85% FTP...and I did the 60-90 min weekday workouts over the weekend. All this said, life is what it is, and I have done my best. I've done enough HIMs that I don't worry about the lack of a true RR, per se.
Anyway, I want to confirm with you the wisest thing for the next 10 days, in particular the next several days.
- Wed: swim
- Thu: long run. According to previous advice a couple of months ago, you said "max 16 miles" I had been planning on a 2 hour run at 7:30 pace...my theoretical MP is around 7:00. If done straight, that would be 16 mi. Quitting at 2 hours max seems reasonable given the HIM coming up in 10 days. Throwing in a lot of faster running (e.g., 7:00 pace) seems like it would make recovery harder.
- Fri: RR swim, easy run (as in HIM plan)
- Sat or Sun, depending on recovery and schedule: Last weekend brick, as written in HIM plan; other day off.
- Remaining (race) week more or less as written in the HIM plan
Any last minute thoughts you have on this would be very helpful. I'm sure I'll be in touch after KS to talk about getting ready for the marathon in that two weeks.
Comments
I thnk you make a good point that I have a premium on being able to perform well at KS without being crushed at the end of it. Thanks for fixing up my thinking.
If this all works out, maybe I'll go for a marathon PR in Boston. :-)