I started the Sub 3:30 Marathon training plan yesterday. Day 1 was a simple enough 3 mile run at 9 minute mile pace. I didn’t run it that slowly but I did a normal 5km (3 mile) loop around the park. So even though it was day 1 of the training plan, it was just a normal day’s jogging. Day 2 is somewhat different. Can someone explain the following please?
5M of 1M jog, then
4x800m at approx 10K
pace (3:30) with 400m
jog in three minutes,
then 1M jog
What?! This is exactly the sort of confusing instruction that puts me off training properly. It makes no sense. For a start, it changes units from imperial to metric, then back to imperial. What do I set my Garmin to? Miles or kilometres? Here’s what I think it means….
1.6km jog
800m fast pace but I need to calculate what 8/10 of 3:30 is.
400m jog (take 3 mins)
800m fast pace but I need to calculate what 8/10 of 3:30 is.
400m jog (take 3 mins)
800m fast pace but I need to calculate what 8/10 of 3:30 is.
400m jog (take 3 mins)
800m fast pace but I need to calculate what 8/10 of 3:30 is.
400m jog (take 3 mins)
1.6km jog (or actually it’s a 2km jog because this 1.6km jog is just after the last 400m jog.
Let me add that up….
Yeah that’s 8km which is 4.97 miles. That must be what I’m required to do then. And thanks to this website I have been able to calculate that 800m at 3:30 per km pace is 2:48
http://www.coolrunning.com/engine/4/4_1/96.shtml
You know what I am going to do instead? Run 8km and do a bit of fartlek. 800m fast, 400m slower, repeat 4 times. If I try to calculate this properly I’ll give up running forever.
Is it just me? Does anyone follow these instructions properly without a track and/or a coach with a stopwatch? I wont be able to calculate 2:48 per 800m, but I can guesstimate because I know what a 3:30 km feels like – fast!
So I did it and it was a hard session. I never maintained 3:30 per km pace, but seeing as that would equate to a 17:30 5km (my PB is 20:07), that is not too surprising. My fastest pace was 3:19 but during the 800m of hard running I averaged around 3:45.
In total I ran 5.03 miles (8.11km) in 37:25 and Garmi gave me a 3.5 out of 5.0 for effort! Max heart rate was 172bpm which indicates that (despite Garmi’s conservative scoring) I was really trying – my max ever recorded was 177bpm and I average 142bpm.
Here’s the training plan I am following.
http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/news/images/asics/ASICS_TRAININGPLANS_Sub%203.30.pdf
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