Last week was the final week of heavy training before the start of the 3 week taper. It culminated with a 20 mile slow run - the last really long run before the marathon.
The forecast was for a storm to blow in at about 8.30 am so I set off at 6 am to avoid most of it. As part of the run I was testing my nutrition strategy for the marathon so had 3 Lucozade gels and 3 bottles of Lucozade Sport Elite to work through!
Just before I started I took my first gel and drank some sports drink before setting off on a 5.5 mile loop, carrying the bottle. The aim was to finish the drink during the loop before arriving back home to pick up the next bottle.
This went perfectly. I finished the bottle just in time to put it in a bin, strip off a layer and arrive home to discard the layer and pick up the next bottle.
Now for an 11 mile loop where I was to work my way through the bottle and take 2 more gels. I took the next gel at about 11 miles and by the time I got to 15 miles I felt on top of the world! The gel had caffeine in it so that was probably responsible for my "high"!
At the end of the loop I took my last gel, picked up my last bottle and finished off with a 3.5 mile loop.
I am not sure if it was the nutrition or the training or both but this run was awesome. I completed it in 2:43, 6 minutes faster than my previous best at this distance. I felt pretty good at the end and could definitely have done another 6 miles. Chester here I come!
My other training:
Tue: 10 miles with 4 * 1200m intervals
Wed: 7 miles with the club including hills and 1 Km intervals
Fri: 11 miles slow
Sat: 4 miles slow
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