coach’s wisdom
So, I asked Coach what my goal should be for the marathon. I was going to summarize his response but then I thought, “Why deprive my readers of his eloquent words of advice”?
No goal.
Approach this race completely unfettered. Picture yourself at the starting line relaxed and excited among a throng of people all worried about that first mile split. You, on the other hand, will run easily and naturally according to how you feel.
Miles 1 – 5: smooth and steady
Miles 6 – 10: smooth and steady
Miles 11- 15: smooth and steady
Miles 16 – 20: smooth and manageable
Miles 20 – finish: smooth and workIn the beginning run with less effort than you are capable of. Once ‘warmed up’ you can settle into the endurance pace – perhaps one like you ran your 20 miler at recently. No hard numbers, just miles rolling smoothly under the feet. At the low spot approaching 20 miles (when the race seems a little long), a little more work is involved in keeping a steady pace. Try to keep the pace and you may find a second wind on the other side of a mile or two that will give you a few more miles of steady pace (with work). By this time, the horses can smell the barn and putting in the extreme effort to not slow down is more easily managed because the mind knows it’s not for long.
I think approaching the race in this manner you will discover the secret to good marathon times is not running fast – it is not slowing down. And that is why a smooth pace and low heart rate is required for the first 15 miles or so. Once you enter the “work” phase (focusing on maintaining pace) you should be up near 20 miles (if not beyond) and the heart rate will probably get up to “tempo” range.
“The secret to good marathon times is not running fast – it is not slowing down”. Fabulous. This is the kind of wisdom I’ve been getting from Andrew for almost a year.
It will be interesting to see what pace “smooth and steady” turns out to be. Yesterday and today’s 3 mile runs averaged out to 7:43 min/mile. That’s including a generous 1+ mile warm up.
Comment by Anonymous
Get back to me after Sunday.
Comment by 
Thursday September 06, 2007 @
Oooh, I like that quote towards the end. Great way to look at the effort. And it sounds like you’re in for quite a treat in Regina.