Thursday, November 29, 2012

Fukuoka Marathon

It has been a very long 4 weeks since the New York marathon was cancelled. It's difficult to predict how the body will react after peaking fully for a race and then having 4 weeks to reset. After speaking with several other athletes in the same situation I realized that there is certainly no consensus on how to approach the next race. My coach and I decided it would be best to bring the mileage back up and recreate the last 4 weeks of training leading up to New York. I didn't come back to peak mileage, but started at 130 and slowly worked back down with the majority of workouts focused on threshold pace. Having never experienced this before, it is difficult to predict what Fukuoka will bring this weekend, but my workouts have continued to improve and I'm still feeling fresh. I'm determined to not waste the fitness I had built leading up to NYC. With that said, this will be 18 straight weeks of training, and I will be grateful for the break that will follow the marathon on Sunday. My wife and I will be traveling to Vietnam and Cambodia for a couple of weeks where I look forward to a little down time and hopefully reflecting on a positive marathon experience.

The race has a very deep field. It's a fast course, so everyone here is geared up to go out fast and nail a great time. There will be two pace groups, the first starting around 4:48 per mile and the second at approximately 4:58. I will certainly be attaching myself to that second group at 2:10 pace. It will be quite a bit faster than I went out in my first marathon in Houston, but my training has shown that I am prepared for this kind of pace.  I want to come away from Japan with a solid personal best and another positive step toward Rio in 2016.