Today's workout: 5 miles at "marathon" pace.
I really had to think this out. What will be my"marathon" pace? I've never run one, so I'm not quite sure. I've run 3 half marathons, but they are completely different animals. My pace for those averaged about 8:00/mile. Do I add 30 seconds to that? Do I add a minute? I'm not quite certain.
What I do know is what I know. And that is that a 5 mile run I could virtually do in 40 minutes with some effort. What I'm thinking is that I'm not supposed to put too much effort into this run today. A marathon pace should be an easy pace. I started with a 6.0 pace for 5 minutes, then 6.5 for 5 minutes then to 7.0, and finally to 7.2 to finish it off. This made my run about 43 minutes long. I wasn't winded, I was still in my comfort zone. And that pace ended up being about 8:34. Is this my marathon pace? I can't help but wonder.
I'd love to be able to run the thing in less than four hours. A 9:16 pace would be exactly that...4 hours. For me that seems feasible. But I may be overestimating what I am capable of. I'm hoping not. I think what I will do is consider my "comfortable" pace to be faster than my "marathon" pace. I'm going to aim for an 8:40 marathon pace.
Crazy? Maybe I am. I suppose that is what Marathon Training is all about. To see what you are capable of.
It's gonna be a long 18 weeks.
1 comments:
But I think a comfortable pace is supposed to be slower than a marathon pace. You may be 'comfortable' going close to cheetah speed for 5 miles, but you have to consider you'll have an additional 20 miles to go. I typically don't train at 8:30 (my fastest sustained pace) - that's what my new 5k race pace is. I'm 'comfortable', esp with long distances, between 10-9:30. And that's a new comfortable for me. It used to be much slower. Did you get in touch with him yet? Maybe you'll know more after an 18 or 20 miler.
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