The Lonely Swimmer

I started my New York marathon specific training two weeks ago. I follow a neat plan for triathletes that assumes you did train during all of the season and want to finish with a fall marathon (exactly for me thus). It’s just seven weeks, with three weeks build, one rest week, two weeks build and one taper. The magic (and lazy) thing about the plan is that the long long runs are at most two hours 15 minutes, but directly afterwards you hit the bike for about two hours – trains the fat metabolism, spares the joints. And is more fun than only running.

There’s also a swim per week, which I replace by the freestyle training I do with the Academic Sports Association, and two to three core strength workouts. Overall about ten workouts with one rest day. It’s quite a bit more than what I train usually, but running always was a big part of my triathlon training and with all the strength training (which I usually skip) I’m not afraid I’ll get myself injured.

Having a goal like the NYC Marathon is even motivating enough to get me out of bed about twice a week for an early morning run, something I could only do if I was to meet somebody for running until now. The extra volume is quite visible in my weekly training hours:

So the rightmost yellow block is today’s easy run, the two columns left of it are weeks 1 and 2 of the plan. I skipped one run and one bike in week 2, that’s why the volume has gone down a little. But still, it’s more than before (where I got a bit lazy). Also, it’s not going to be my most social seven weeks as I’m every evening either training or super tired. I’ll have a life after New York again. (Actually, it’s not that bad.)

To top up week 1, I replaced the “fast” weekend run by Pfäffikerseelauf, a 12.3 km race around Lake Pfäffikon (which I did last year already) on Sunday. I went without much expectations, having quite some mileage in my legs already, and the excuse “I did it out of full training” was neatly prepared.

I did a longer warm up than I’ve ever done for a race, almost half an hour with drills and what not, but I guess that was a smart thing to do. It was again a warm day, and sweaty but ready I lined up for the start. I met Oli in the crowd and said hi, exchanged a few words about plans and even got a mention on his blog. Me, the pacemaker! ;)

The course was mostly flat with one climb shortly after half of the distance. I remember the I almost blew up there last year, but this year I wouldn’t be as surprised.

We started, rather fast as always, and I got ready for my legs to become leaden.

Which they simply didn’t! I felt very strong throughout the whole race, kept passing people and really enjoyed it. It was not my fastest race, but I felt almost as good as I did during Reusslauf (which was my best racing experience so far).

The climb went fine as well, and I was looking forward to the rolling hills after it. This was taken at about ten kilometres:

I could keep up something like a 3:45 min/km pace for the last four kilometres and had quite a strong finish. The guy just in front of me somehow stopped running a few metres before the end so I had the choice of passing him (and running into the scaffolding of the finish) or slowing down as well. Which I did, because had I been the guy, I would have thought that’s it’s mighty stupid to blast past somebody else one metre before the finish if you’re not even fighting for a podium spot or something.

It ended up being somebody of my age group, but I was in the top 10 of my age group anyway (a first!) and was happy to see that this was my second best ZüriLaufCup performance, improving my total by 48 points. I’m now 9th in the series for my age group, it’s impossible for me to pass anybody in front of me and I can’t be passed by anybody behind me in the last race (Üetliberglauf), so I probably won’t even go. Unless I can squeeze it in my plan, of course, because it’s pretty and actually very close to my place.

This we ran:

I’m thinking of doing a half marathon at the end of next week as a final test (and breaking that stupid 1:24:24 barrier): Hallwilerseelauf (which I did last year). Viktor Röthlin does it as well, and he’s going to New York, so it must be a smart idea.

(Vik also says “don’t just copy the pros”. But it really fits into my plan!)