Run Faster

Have you heard about this? From the web site:

Running America is a documentary film that will follow elite adventurer Charlie Engle (Running The Sahara) and the only person in the world to complete the Triple Crown of Extreme Sports, Marshall Ulrich, on their record breaking run from San Francisco to New York.

One of the great things about this documentary - as if running across the U.S. wasn’t already good enough - is that ordinary runners have been ‘cast’ to run with Charlie and Marshall as they make their way across the country. If you live in the U.S. and are somewhere near the path of the run, you may still be able to sign up to run with them. I was going to join them for a portion of their run through Colorado, but unfortunately, I’m not going to be able to do that because of a scheduling conflict.

The runners seem to be a bit behind where they had wanted to be because both of them, but especially Charlie, have been plagued by injuries. If you have the time and inclination, I’d encourage you to follow their progress by reading their blog, and to send some good thoughts their way.

And speaking of sending out good thoughts…best of luck to all of you that are running a fall half marathon or marathon in the next few weeks, especially to Rachel and Terri, both of whom are running their marathons this weekend. Enjoy yourself and run strong.

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In the training plan I’m following for the New York Marathon (the plan in Matt Fitzgerald’s book, Brain Training for Runners), there’s a huge emphasis on running your training runs at specific paces.

As I mentioned in my last post, I’ve just entered the peak phase of my training for the marathon. This phase incorporates a few longer runs at my goal marathon pace. I did the first one last weekend.

Although the run was kind of tough, the saving grace was that it was shorter than a lot of my long runs have been lately - only 10 miles. The middle 8 were supposed to be run at my goal marathon pace. I’m happy to report that I was able to achieve this. I can’t say it was easy, but I felt fairly strong after the run, and it really boosted my confidence.

If you’re training for a marathon, I wouldn’t recommend doing these marathon pace runs every weekend, but I do see the value in doing them a few times as you’re peaking for a race, because:

1. They’re a huge confidence booster, and
2. They train your body to understand what race pace feels like.

If you’d like to incorporate some goal-pace workouts into your training schedule, this article from Running Planet has some great suggestions.

Some of the other “tune-up” workouts in my schedule during this peak phase are a half-marathon time trial, tempo runs at half-marathon pace, and of course, the standard base pace long runs.

Those of you that are doing a fall marathon - what are some of the workouts you’re doing to reach your peak?

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