The Taper

Runners World article on handling the 3 weeks leading up to a marathon.

I'm officially tapering now, which essentially means I'm going to draw my mileage down by about 15% or so, and throttle back on the intensity. I'm done with the 20+ mile runs...until the marathon itself. This week's long run is going to be more similar to the long runs of 12 weeks ago. And it's going to be a functional run too, since I'm going to use that opportunity to save some gas and reduce my carbon footprint a little bit, and replace my car with my feet.

I'm going to have to adjust a little since I normally gear everything to do the long run on the weekend. But I want to do this on Friday, which means I need to preserve a little more energy during the week than I might normally.

I stayed off my feet yesterday, but put in a good, solid hour of interval work today, which felt very good and invigorating. I did a routine of 3 mile repeats with half mile intervals in between. I did the miles at around a 7:30 pace, which was slower than I did them last week; and I did the recovery intervals at a 9:00 pace. I also reduced the number of repeats from 4 to 3, compared to last week.

After recovering from the 3rd fast mile, I went right into 3x880 intervals. I felt good enough that I probably could have bumped the pace up to 7:00 (or 3:30 per 880), but I kept it at a Yasso pace corresponding to a 3:45 marathon (which means a 7:30 pace or 3:45 per 880). I sweated a lot, but I never really busted a lung at all and my legs only started to tire towards the end of the session. In fact, I was pretty surprised my ventilation levels were so good. I was probably running under my lactate threshold since I could pass the talk test pretty easily. (I tried the old "Pledge of Allegiance" test...I have to search and find that Web page for reference again.)

I did wear a heart monitor. I've lost touch with where my training zones are nowadays and I'll probably have to recalibrate sometime soon. I don't think my maximum heart rate has changed. It shouldn't, actually. I'm estimating it's somewhere around 175. But what I am noticing is that 160-165 (91-94% of max) used to be pretty hard, but now I can sustain that kind of comfortably now. It actually feels more like a tempo-level of exertion when I'm at that HR range.

I'm not sure how to interpret that. After the marathon, and as I adjust to work on my 5K/10K performance, I'm going to reevaluate my HR zones and try to figure out what the before/after differences mean. They ought to mean something good, as in my aerobic capacity has improved. I hope so. I do think my aerobic/anaerobic threshold has shifted upwards slightly.

Back on the taper subject, I'm going to have to really watch my diet. With my workouts getting lighter, I have to make sure I don't over eat. The link above says to expect a little weight gain during these next 3 weeks, and that's a good thing for prepping for the marathon. But I need to make sure it's good weight, and not chips & salsa weight.

Tomorrow, I'm going to do an easy 7-mile loop during lunch at less than marathon goal pace. I haven't done this one in awhile. Promise to myself: no stop watch...no racing...keep it slow and relaxing.