Caz's London Marathon
Thank you to Caz for sharing a little about her London Marathon experience. She ran an incredible 3hr15min marathon after putting in a solid (and sometimes gruelling!) running block that included running almost every single day in the build-up to the race. The hard work payed off after she took over 15min off her old PB! We’re pleased to see her Personal Best Vest is taking pride of place in her gym.
"London 2019 was my 3rd marathon and the only one that I have trained for. In October 2018 at the European duathlon champs in Ibiza, I stumbled across this lovely guy from Inverness who offered to coach me. He sent me weekly training plans for 13 weeks, with my 1st long run on week 1 being 15 miles. He believes in running every day and running 63 miles a week. He was an amazing marathon runner in his day and trained with the likes of Steve Jones.
So, running on tired legs every day was quite gruelling, even though there were lots of easy runs. The training programme was all about running on feel so there were easy runs, steady runs and fast runs. I gave myself a rest day every 10 days as I needed it and you have to listen to your body and do what works and feels right for you. Anyway, my final long run of 24 miles was week 9 on Chesterfield canal and I did it in 3hrs05. With a pace of 7:43 min/mile... This gave me the confidence to go for a 3hr15 at London...
Training for London had gone really well. I felt good on the day and started out at 7:26 min/miles. This was my target pace so I was very disciplined and kept to it from the start. I was glued to my watch basically. My coach had said to me that at mile 20 I will feel a million dollars… and I did. I allowed my pace to drop to 7:23 and I was overtaking people. I was running happy and I knew I was well on track to get sub 3hr15… but then with 1k to go, the actual time on my watch said something ridiculous like 3hr11 and I knew I wasn't going to make it.
I gave it everything and crossed the line in 3hr15 and 3 flipping seconds… I'd actually ran 26.44 miles that's why my average pace was out of sync. If only I had know about the blue line!!! In summary, I was over the moon to get 3hr15 but devastated to miss out on a championship place by 3 seconds. Every race you learn from and I absolutely loved my London experience and have a lovely vest framed on my gym wall to remind me."
