11 weeks to Canberra Marathon

A rebuilding week to fully recover from the calf strain. Because of the injury then the running for this week is planned to be all at or as close to 5 - 5.15 minute pace per k with the hope that will not put too much of a the recovery but is at a pace where I am a little bit in front of maintaining my present level of fitness. BUT that is after a test run on Monday.

I kind of week where my base fitness does not go back and if anything goes a little forward because there are no planned 'rest' days although the k's will be less that or about the average. However I will treat each day individually as to how the calf feels.

12.6 Sunday 25 January: A calf test
Went out steady and managed 11k @ 5.18 and all felt okay. No twinge. Did the Achilles stretches before running. Iced after and massage in the night.

12.5 Monday 26 January : A tougher calf test
It just felt much better was I was warming up and stretching before the run. Decided to run a bit further and although I had the Garmin on I planned to run how the calf felt. Ended with 13.5k @4.58. Just about where I plan to be for the rest of the week. Second and last visit to my physio early tomorrow morning

12.4 Tuesday 27 January : Tougher and hills : 15.3k @ 5.07

Nothing works over a dodgy calf and Achilles like powering up hills on your toes. So I have reverted back to some variations of the Bay run to put back the hills I took out when I started in December. This is not the planned hill sessions but just moving up the difficulty for a few weeks before some specific hill drills.

The hills slowed me down a bit and I was cautious and because I have not trained hard on them for 2 months my technique was sloppy. Still I survived and was heartened by the fact the the calf had no issues and the Achilles was a minor discomfort that I can train with.

12.3 Wednesday 28 January: More hills : 15.5k @4.53

I added the last set of hills so that very little of the run is along the Bay route but is near it so that it has as many hills as possible. I will not add any more but for some sessions will adda lap of the Bay itself which because I start from very close to home will make the lap about 10k in total.

I just pushed and pushed all the way with no idea of the overall pace but could see from the Garmin that on the flats I was getting close to 4.20 - Yikes!! but the hills soon took that back. I was suprised at the over pace and that pushing up all the hills I had no injury issues. So it is now declared that there will be no further mention of either of these issues again as hopefully they are no longer a factor to be taken into account in the training.

Forward and for ever faster towards Canberra !!!!

12.2 Thursday 29 January: All's working well !! 25k@5.01

The same hilly loop as yesterday and then a lap of the Bay which adds about 10k because of where I start the original loop. It was very humid and it was tough to hold the pace from yesterday and then add10k to the run. But done.

12.1 Friday 30 January : 21.5k @ 5.06

Twilight Series at Parramatta Park - 10k @ 4.22 pace

A week in which I got back into some steady running with the calf sorted out. Just 119k for the week but it was a cautious start.

Summary for the month

For the month 514k that was down from last month but caused buy a couple of weeks with low ks. I am not sure where I am at in regard to running a 3 hour marathon in April as I am just in teh end of the base building stage and so not anaerobic work has been done. However even without any anaerobic work my 10k times are firm and certainly at a pace I have not trained at.

I have to be satisfied where I am at eventhough I don't really know where that is because quite frankly I could nit have trained harder. So where ever that is it is the best I can/could be.