Preparing for the Chicago Marathon 2012

Hmmm. Looks like I sorta suck at blogging. I haven’t written a damn thing since Houston in January. I never did the 2011 year-end recap I’d thought about, woops (summary: it was a good running year for me). I’ve had plenty to say all year while training with others - advice, questions, strategizing, conjecture, criticism, hollow theories, etc, just haven’t typed it out. Oh, well. Hopefully what I write below will be worth reading. The experience of training and racing this past year has actually been incredibly rewarding as well as humbling for me – the ups, the downs, the challenges, the triumphs, and finally the big payoff of running a marathon PR.

It’s been 19 years since I toed my first marathon start line with 2:37 (6:00 pace) as an A-Goal and sub-2:40 as an “easy” fallback (I ended up in 2:47). Since then I’d run another 26 marathons, not always with 2:3x as a goal time, but fairly often so, and had come up short every single time.

In summer and Fall of 2011, averaging high 70s per week with a few weeks in the 85-90 range during the 20 week buildup to CIM had seemed adequate, more volume than ever before, with some quality workouts and shorter races mixed in. But after the late-race fades at CIM and then Houston, I decided to re-up a commitment to volume. To quote my last blog entry: “I can’t help but think there’s gotta be more where that came from, and am already thinking about a debut at Chicago in 2012 (registration opens Feb. 1). Although the prospect of increasing from my peak weeks of 85/90 to 100+ (and a few 28-mi long runs) does not sound real appealing at the moment, I can’t think of anything else (legal) that might get me through those final miles at goal pace. It may require another 300 hours on my feet to achieve just those final 40 minutes at the right pace.”

I decided I would need to train almost like an elite to run like even a sub-elite or decent age-group competitor. Inspiration came from seeing things like an interview with Cam Levins – killing it in the 10,000 and talking about having peaked at 150 mpw. Distance makes you fast. From seeing Shalane out running the Springwater trail, and her dominance at the trials and gutsy performance in London, knowing how hard she works. Distance makes you fast. From seeing Farah/Rupp in the Olympic 10,000 – what a race! From remembering Brian Sell: when 110-120 wasn’t enough, increasing to 140-160 and making the 2008 Olympic marathon team. Distance makes you fast.

To kick it off I decided to do 5 x 80 mpw leading up to the July 4^th half, which I raced in 75:27 (5:45/mi). I then quickly built through the high 80s and 90s, culminating in exactly 200 miles in 14 days (no doubles) during the wks starting July 23 and July 30. My 20 week marathon buildup looked like this:

64, 75, 80, 80, 80, 80, 40, 86, 91, 100, 100, 88, 88, 82, 89, 88, 48, 79, 61 (wk ending 9/30 - 7 days before marathon).

The 40 and 48 were weeks that each had 3 consecutive planned days off – intentional rest. I didn’t miss any days other than those 6 during the entire training cycle. I ran 13 consecutive Wed medium-long runs of 15-18 miles and the following 16 weekend long run distances (qty):  

17 (2), 19 (1), 20 (1), 21 (5), 24 (3), 25 (1), 27 (1), 28 (2)

I could include lots more detail, but basically I did some tempo runs, a couple 10K races, some MP runs, a few fast intervals, but mostly just did pretty high volume, tried to get enough rest, and continued eating well (and a LOT) and taking supplements (all legal – I swear!). I believe what I did this year really built on what I did last year with the 3377 miles in 2011, and I needed both that base and this solid training cycle to finally be strong enough to race a marathon the way I (and others) have expected me to for years.

It may go without saying, but training properly is a huge commitment. The endless 4 and 5 am early mornings for me, the only time that works well, considering my 16-mile RT bike commute, long work hours, a full-time admin management position in a non-profit stretched for resources, and all life's other little stresses (and we don't even have kids!).  

In the next post I’ll talk about the actual race.