Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Sort of tapering into the marathon

I did take some rest days over the weekend. My wife and I were both feeling somewhat sick all weekend, so that gave me a good excuse to take a couple rest days.

It's hard to know if I should taper for this marathon or not. And, considering how few miles I've run this year, what would a taper be?

Yesterday, I rode my bike to and from CrossFit. To start the workout, I did 3 sets of heavy back squats (5 reps each). After that, I was scheduled to do 5 sets of 10 reps of front squats, at 170 pounds. I knew that this would hit my quads and I didn't want to trash my quads at all with the marathon in five days. So, I did 5 sets of 10 back squats instead, at a light weight (135 pounds).

After that, the main workout was pretty straightforward:

5 rounds, as quickly as possible:
Run 200 meters

My squat snatch form is nowhere near as good as the person in the video link. To do a good squat snatch, you really need to have a good overhead squat, and that's a lift where I have some mobility issues. So, my squat snatches were closer to muscle snatches, to be honest. I was very happy that my shoulder didn't complain putting 95 pounds overhead 25 total times. The workout took me just under 11 minutes.

Today, I rode to work, and after work, I'll ride to CrossFit, hoping to dodge the forecast storms. Our workout tonight starts with strict presses and bench presses, so it won't be a leg-intensive workout.

After today, I won't do any more CrossFit workouts until after the marathon. On Thursday, I'm planning to do my bike commute, but nothing more. Friday, I'll run an easy 3 miles with my wife. And Saturday will be a rest day.

I've never prepared for a marathon anything like this one. I'm curious to see how I feel in the later miles on Sunday.

1 comment:

Jeff Farbaniec said...

Damon, good luck in your marathon this weekend. I keep saying that I don't need to do another marathon (I've only done a half dozen or so, nothing near your record), but somehow I feel there will be another in my future.