Marathon training in six easy steps!

 So here it is Blog, well at least one of six is! I wrote you last week about the preparation phase for a marathon and the ins outs and the ups and downs and roundabouts therein.

At the Pink Panther University, a friend who was reading phycology happened to mention one evening, some work that had been done some quarter of a century earlier on stress adaptation by Hans Selye. Sounded interesting and as I was planning to run my first marathon I thought the ideas that Selye propounded were worth considering, after all, marathon running is just simply getting your body used to stress for a couple of hours. So, as they say. That was it. HOOKED. All my training henceforth and for ever more was based on the Selys analysis.

So all training was switched to stress conditioning which incorporated no easy / rest type sessions. Recovery came as a consequence of being knackered and the body was slowed and forced into a recovery phase because it had no option.

So take 1:à with a prize for you Blog if you guess which of the Godiva posed for the artist to sketch the runner. The clue is in the hair!! Not the athlete is starting nice and easy, not going mad.

Marathon six months away … this twelve weeks into lark that is the modern way of thinking does give not allow leeway to stresses and strains and niggerly injuries!! Not what all the books say Blog?? Or all those magazines?? Or all those coaches with the arms weighted down with badges?? Oh well, you pays your quids and you takes your chance. Do not pass Go.

Giving specific programmes is really farcical if you think about it. 10 times 400 in 67 with 45 sec 200 recovery etc.. Cobblers. What if you feel rough? What do you do? What happened if a gale is blowing and it is stair rodding rain? Training should be given generally; the individual can sort out the specifics … more satisfying that way. More fun. ……So, plenty of junk miles, get the old body used to going the distance … the marathon should not be offering a question mark as to whether the distance can be covered. The marathon should be a race against the opposition, not against 26 miles (42 kilometres to you Blog). And of course, with high junk mileage, the danger is a repetitive strain injury. So a bit of fartlek, a session of reps and a regime of exercise is all part of the none specific introduction to the first phase of the six to be outlined at no cost to you Blog. To race or not to race, that is the question at this time of preparation. The thing to remember is that the aim is a marathon, nothing else. Nothing. NOTHING. So if you fancy a race, race. No matter what the distance. No matter what the surface. The race is for battery charging. But don’t be too stupid. To gain some benefit, give your body a chance to perform. Don’t race totally knackered because you are not racing and you are gaining no benefit. So instead of battery charging you are digging a hole, a hole in the ground which is big and sort of round, into which to plummet. So the change becomes self-defeating, mentally and physically!!

Don’t forget to sling a few weights around and a daily routine of a few exercises won’t’ come amiss, though stretching per sec is a bit of a waste of time if you ask me, Blog. Remember basics, like avoiding as much road pounding as possible, park grass is better. And use common sense, if you run in the park, run on the grass not on the paths!!! Look at all those burks running on the paths in the park. Pathetic. Enjoy a few cross country runs when you are knackered.

So two of six will be a little more detailed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                          Colin

PS Next Tuesday guess what I will be doing, Blog. There is no way Blog that you will come remotely close to having a correct guess. Not a chance. Not a sniff. Try the lottery; you will have more chance of success. Never done the lottery myself, I don’t like the odds.