For the first time in 10 years I decided to ‘put all my eggs in one basket’ and just train for this one race, marathon specific,  with no other races in between and therefore no missing of long runs, tapering or unnecessary speed work. I had a decent bass over Christmas and planned to put in a solid 16 week block of training.

I also decided to get use a coach for the first time ever, and consulted good mate Gary Mullins who I know well, trust and respect. Gary’s advice and training plan was fairly simple- given our age (45) and years of training, focus on more hills and strength, less speed work and quality in weekend long runs. Plus adding a rest day every week. My biggest week was 120km and average 100km for Jan and 116 for Feb and into March. I felt great, taking Friday’s off left me fresher for my Sunday long runs and the quality of them was better than ever before, getting comfortable running marathon pace for various blocks a number of times.

Around March 14th the inevitable happened, Coronavirus caused the postponement of the London marathon and my cousin’s wedding and it became clear we wouldn’t risk travelling either. 

Whilst I knew it was coming, I was gutted. Really gutted. But I had my health and my job and after a few low days started looking forwards. I carried on training and decided to still do something. I read a few marathon coaches saying it is best to try and simulate a race then take a period off to reset and prepare to train for a potential Sept/Oct races such as Boston and London (if they happen). 

 

My first plan was to get a group together to simulate a time trial but a week later it was clear that guidance was changing and group activities were being clamped down. I was also thinking about doing the August NSW Half Marathon course around Homebush twice. As I was working from home and the moves towards no ‘non-essential travel’ escalated I also started wondering where I could run a marathon near our home and completed a few 1km and 2km rep sessions around a flat and quiet loop in St Ives. I started thinking I could run the whole marathon on the loop and with a friend living in one of the streets, I put use his front lawn for a drinks table.

With my 46th birthday on Sunday 5th April and the chance we could soon follow the UK policy of only 30 mins of outdoor exercise allowed, I decided to have a go on my birthday, 3 weeks earlier than the planned date for London. So I tapered off and measured the 1.23km loop with a car, bike computer and Garmin and planned out the required distance.

This was the closest I would ever get to the Nike breaking 2 project, I got to choose the course, date and start time etc 

 

‘Race’ Day.

Clocks changed so first light at 6am and started soon after. Up at 5.15 after a crap sleep, a mixture of nerves and adrenaline – a good sign -it felt like a normal race day, helped by laying out my kit the night before and a 2 week taper.

Weather was looking perfect and thanks to Geoff I had a pair of Nike next %s.  Agreed with John Binfield that he would circle by on his long run and shout some support. Coach Gary also said he would join for a few laps on foot and bike to help me.

6am and as I set up my drinks table, Elliott came out and swept the road outside his house and set up some chairs for him and the kids to watch from.

Warmed up for around 1.5km and got going. Had a Gu gel 30 mins before the start and another 7 lined up on my table with small bottles of water.

 

Started well and felt good, first few kms at 3:36, 3:37, 3:37, 3:36, 3.40, 3:38. Grabbed a gel, held it for half a lap then ate it 100m before the table and grabbed a water bottle on the next lap. Did this after roughly 6km, 13, 20, 27, 34 and 39km. 

 

7th km 3:41 followed by 3:45, 3:42, 3:33. Kms. Aries a bit due to a slight uphill and downhill section but surface was good. 3:37, 3:41, 3:37, 3:42. 14km in and feeling good, saying hi to the walkers and dog walkers. 3:40, 3:37, 3:40, 3:44, 3:41. 3:43 and 3:35, halfway in 77:10 ish. 

 

Courtney and the kids had walked up to watch and gave me a great lift to see them. 

 

Right knee felt a little sore though and wondered if it was the right hand turns so U-turned and ran a lap in reverse. Next splits were slow due to the turn and loss of momentum 3:48 and 3:56 and had decided to turn again and go back to my favoured direction. Time to dig in a bit and keep it going. 24km 3:41, 3:43, 3:41, 3:42, 3:43, 3:40, 3:44. Up to 30km, legs ok, breathing steady and feeling strong, felt like pushing but held back a bit still, still a long way to go, just hold this to 35km and re-assess. 3:39, 3:38, 3:40, 3:42, 3:46. Another gel and water stop executed and PB is on, few locals were now watching from their front lawns and I was buzzing. 3:41, 3:44, 3:40. Never held pace so well so deep into a marathon and was close enough to the end to think about pushing on harder, 39th km 3:43, 40th km 3:41 then decided to rip, 41st km 3:27, 42nd km 3:31 with the hill, into the home straight to break the toilet paper finish tape held by the kids ! 2:35:09 for probably longer than the exact required distance. Training paid off, controlled throughout the run. Just shows you don’t need a huge field and a big offshore race, just the right training and enough desire.