Melbourne Marathon training - week 4

Another 135km week.

It should have been about 140km but I had to cut my AM and PM recovery runs short on Friday due to time constraints. I don't think it did me any harm but I do like to see the mileage going up.

It was a successful week running wise as I got some good quality in.

On the Monday I did my 8km tempo run.  I wasn't as fresh for this as I hoped I would be. Saturday's long run with David was a bit harder than planned and the start of the Tour de France has impacted on sleep quantity slightly. I think I will have to ration my viewing for the big mountain stages as the sprint finish stages are like watching basketball (ie you only have to watch the last 5 minutes).
Felt very comfortable early on the tempo section but as usual it got harder around the Narrows. I need to find a better loop, maybe I will head out to Lake Monger one morning.

So in the end this tempo was was pretty similar to last week. Averaged 3:39-3:40/km for the 8km.

On Tuesday I did a 24km medium long run. Ran the first 12km @ 4:24/km average pace then ran an 11km progression before 1km jog home. Haven't worked out average pace of the progression but overall pace was down to 4:16/km by 23km. Ran the last km of the 11k @ MP but at 3:47 it turned out to be quicker than MP which was pretty encouraging.

Wednesday was a double recovery run and then on Thursday I did the regular 21km medium long run around the Bridges with Rob. We ran a bit quicker this week than last week, although it still felt easy and conversational at an average pace of 4:30/km. We picked it up a bit from the flagpole but stopped for a quick chat with Simon E and then I never really got going again.

Double recovery on Friday and then long run Saturday. The long run ended up being a negative split. I didn't set out with the intention of doing this but after running around 4:30/km pace on the way out I slowly picked it up on the way back and ran the last 16km at around 4:15/km average pace with the last full km @ MP. Recovery run on Sunday before Ben's soccer.

This morning (Monday) I had a pretty average tempo run. I ran 16km with 8km at tempo as I have been doing over the past few weeks. Felt Ok but just didn't crack it with the tempo run. Felt comfortable aerobically but just not the pace I was after. No excuses with the conditions either. Averaged 3:43/km which is the slowest session of the past few weeks. Interestingly even though the tempo was slower, my overall pace for the 16km was quicker at 4:11/km (compared to 4:14/km) mainly due to a quicker cool down. I think the problem may be that my aerobic strength is ahead of my muscular strength. I have been a bit slack on doing (or more accurately, not doing) my strides and this won't have helped. Also I'm just a bit generally tired both from training and slightly reduced sleep from watching the TdF.

So - more sleep and more strides is the plan this week but it gets hard when the Tour moves into the mountains as I think that is when it most resembles running as a competition and that is when it is the best to watch.

This afternoon I went into The Running Centre and picked up a couple of tickets to the showing of Town Of Runners on 25 July. $20 a ticket from the Running Centre. Looks like a great movie. Here is the trailer: