No Marathon - New Plan!!

My last post was Tuesday the 2nd of April, which was 12 days before the Manchester Marathon.   I said in that post that I had just tried and failed to run 20 miles (32k).  Also all the advice of friends and family was that, given my recent hospital visit, I should wait until next year for the marathon...  The run on that Tuesday was 30k, so close to the planned 32k, but not quite there - and I was done in.  So a 42k marathon seemed impossible.  If I had a few weeks to build up the distance then I thought I could do it, but there was little time left.  What has happened since then...

Firstly, I did my usual gentle run the day after the long run.  I find it helps me to get the legs moving, and check out if any injuries etc.  The day after the 30k run I did 8k on the gym treadmill.  A gentle pace, but no injuries and it felt fine.  Last year I think my big mistake was to rely too much on the treadmill, but after the long run on Tuesday, I wanted something with no weather issues and where I could easily stop if needed.  It worked a treat and was a good run on the mill on Wednesday.  It was slow, at 46m for 8k, but felt fine, and made me wonder about the marathon...

Secondly, the success of the treadmill run and the fact that I felt fine the day after the 30k run, meant that I rethought deferring the marathon.  I was busy on the Thursday, but I thought that the Friday (the 5th of April) was still 9 days before the marathon.  I could do a treadmill run at a set slow pace.  If I could keep going for 32k I would do the marathon.  If I couldn't, then I wouldn't.  That was the plan, and I took energy gels and water and was ready for the attempt!  I was going slowly, 4-hour marathon pace, and the first 10k felt fine.  But I started to feel it.  And by 13k I knew a marathon, at any pace, was not possible for me.  I knew I could not keep going for 32k, so I looked at the watch and figured I would up the pace for 3k and do 16k (10 miles) in 90 minutes.  That's not fast, but would mean speeding up.  I did that, and it was fine.  I knew from this that 16k, or even a half-marathon, was achievable.  But I also knew that going beyond that would be silly.  So the decision was made.  No marathon for me this year :-(

Thirdly, the new plan!!  Well, I guess it's two-fold.  Here's the new plan in two sections 😊:

My sister Bob (ok, Kate, but that's just short for Bob...), said I should, for now, concentrate on getting my speed up for shorter distances.  5k or maybe 10k.  I'm a big fan of parkrun so this sounded like a top idea!!  Not doing very long runs was appealing, and getting my speed up will help with longer distances in the future.  It's a plan!

As I said, I couldn't even attempt the marathon. I was too late to defer so I just had to give up the place.  That's fine - these things happen.  But I obviously was emailed a day or two after the marathon day, to see if I wanted to enter the 2025 Manchester Marathon.  And, of course, I did!!  When I entered, it also gave me the option to enter the 2025 Manchester Half-Marathon in October 2024.  With me concentrating on shorter distances over the next few months, and running a marathon in a year, a half in 6 months sounded ideal!  I've entered that race and am very much looking forward to it!!

I have been following the new plan for the last month.  Mainly concentrating on parkrun and doing 5k and 8k runs.  For all these runs I try and do 2 or 3 or 4 k slowly before the 5k or 8k.  But the total distance is rarely more than 10k, and the max so far has been 14k.  My parkrun time is still slow compared to last year, but it's getting there.  I set a Manchester PB last Saturday at 23:16.  Not great, but not so far away from my parkrun PB (set in Penrith last year) of 22:26.  I'll keep doing parkrun when the weather is good, and Alexandra Park in Manchester is an awesome fast course 😊.  I haven't been doing any runs over 14k yet, but I am going to start adding in a weekly longer run when the weather is good.  So 3 or 4 short/fast runs in a week and a maximum of one long/slow run in the week.  That's the plan, but it'll all depend how I feel.  I will concentrate on 5k, but hopefully add a bit of distance.  I'll start half-marathon training at the end of June, so a while yet.  By then I hope to have finally beaten my parkrun PB!!

Anyway, enough blethering - it's only to avoid me doing more useful things!