Miles this week: 27
Still
to go: £673.50
Sadly there were no new donations this week I'm still hopeful more will come in next week. However saying that I did sell one more Aloe Vera plant this week, if you still want a plant then let me know there only £2.00 each and of course it goes without saying all of it goes towards Sense.
I
briefly mentioned last week that I will be starting my three week tapering
period. I don’t quite know what I will do with my Sundays now that there’s no
long run planed.
So I guess some of you are
thinking ‘what is tapering?’
Put
simply, tapering is the gradual reduction of training intensity and duration as
you edge forever closer to race day. It is a necessary part of endurance training
and starts in the last few weeks before the big day. Well so I have read!
Tapering
periods do vary, depending on what distance your race length is. Generally your
last big run should be three weeks before race day. After that the body needs
to be given time to recover and repair itself before it is faced with the full
26.2 miles. This doesn’t mean I get to put my feet up, well not just yet
anyway!
From all the posts/reviews I have read,
tapering is often an incredibly frustrating time for runners - only time will
tell for me I guess. It is also said
that during these three weeks it is common for people to think that, despite
all the hard training, they are still not fit enough. Apparently this means
that some people are often tempted to embark on a handful of hard sessions to
top up their fitness levels. The book says that if you aren't fit enough before
you begin your training wind down, a few more hard training sessions won’t make
any significant difference. The risk you run at picking up an injury is not
worth it as you will not lose your fitness during the tapering period. In fact,
if you do it properly, you are likely to feel fresher on race day than you have
ever felt. Duly noted to self!
As
wonderful as this process seems, there is always the potential of being seduced
into believing that you are capable of feats over and above what the
conditioning prepared you for. If you allow your attitude to run away with you,
you risk blowing everything you’ve worked for. Basically aim to just finish the
marathon, again duly noted to self!
Guess it’s just easy running
for me for the next three weeks now.
This
is what the first week of taper training looks like:
Day
1 = 5 miles
Day
2 = 8 miles
Day
3 = 5 miles
Day
4 = 9 miles
Total = 27 miles
Also,
my song of the week is: Can You Feel It by The Jacksons:
This
week the book provided reminders of all the mental techniques it has encouraged
over the past 14 weeks. It was a quick recap of ‘the most useful techniques to
use during the marathon’, reinforcing important sentiments from the early
chapters. Chapter one aimed to instil the idea that ‘we make our own reality’,
followed by chapter two which discussed the value of maintaining a positive
outlook using the phase ‘but it doesn’t matter’. This was replaced in chapter
four with the ‘as if’ statement as we became stronger, both physically and
mentally. We were then taught in chapters five and six to visualise and use
positive self-talk as the miles started to creep up.
However
the most beneficial information for me from this week’s chapter came with the
reminder about food. It talked about watching what you eat over the tapering
weeks, as you would be used to a high intake of food which is no longer needed.
It did, however, say that I should maintain a high intake of carbohydrates and
fluids. This seems pretty obvious, but
I’m sure if I hadn’t read it I probably wouldn’t have really thought about it.
There
is only 13 days now till London and 55 till Edinburgh. So please sponsor me
some much needed funds only another £675.50 to go! Every £1.00 you can spare
does amazing work, which I have had the pleasure of seeing first-hand.
Leigh
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