It's that special time of year again. A time when ultrarunners the world over are scouring the internet for insane races, listing out ridiculously over-ambitious race plans and trying to explain them to their other halves.
After falling foul of the above situation one too many times, I have myself been planning 2013 rather more carefully than usual. I told myself this year, 2012, would be different. I'd enter less, race less and race better as a result. Unknowingly, I've got my season exactly right only once in the past - in 2010 when I spent 7 months training for and working towards a single goal - Badwater. It's taken me 2 years since, to work out what I had already surmised back then.
I had a very average year this year. I started well running a decent Country to Capital, 43ish miles in 6hrs flat. What's more it felt ok. I went in to Rocky Raccoon 100 three weeks later, too tired. I carried about 10% to 15% fatigue in to that event after running the last 20 miles of C2C about a minute per mile too fast. Rocky was also a massive wash out, but a PB is a PB and 20:19 was ok.
I went on to take a big break whilst I put on the TP100, had my stag do, got married and went on honeymoon. When I came back I messed up by doing too much. In a 6 week period I raced the 53 mile Highland Fling, running a 9:45 which wasn't bad, paced a friend at the Three Forts Marathon, ran the entire length of the SDW, 105ish miles in 21hrs with Neil Bryant and ran a respectable first Comrades in 7:56. All of those results were ok. I felt like I should have done about 10% - 15% better in all of them, but something wasn't quite right. And then 2 weeks after Comrades, having been ill and missing a full nights sleep, I dropped out of the WHW race after 27 miles. I knew within 200 yards of the start line that I shouldn't have been there. I'd fallen foul of my own over-zealousness once again.
So that was the early summer. A bunch of crammed in racing without any great results but with only one really bad one. The rest of the summer was dedicated to UTMB and righting the wrong of 2010 when we got hauled off the course due to landslides. I climbed everything I could, we visited places on holiday just so that I could put myself through the paces in the mountains. When I came home, I ran a 42 mile training run with all the gear followed by a 24 mile session the next day. I was ready. And then they cancelled it, again. It was still a hard race, 105km with 6000+ m of ascent all in the rain and snow was always going to be, but I felt like a fraud running through the streets of Chamonix to an ovation as a 'UTMB finisher'. Instead I switched my focus to a race I was utterly underprepared for and which in my opinion is the ultimate and the hardest ultra race around - Sparta. DNFing Sparta at mile 100 is, weirdly, the highlight of my year. As soon as I crossed that finish line, I knew that the next 12 months were only going to be about one thing. Getting to that statue.
So how do I plan the year leading up to the final weekend in September and a 153 mile road race in the heat........ A race for which you need to be at your absolute best even to stand a chance of making it half way.
I need to take what I know about my own training, racing and recovery to get me on my A game and prepared, in time. Two things stick out at me when I look back over the past 6 or 7 years.
Principally, I just don't recover that quickly from ultras. Secondly, even if I am racing as a 'training run' I am incapable of switching off from the rest of the race and simply enjoying the outing. I will run too hard if I see any other runners and am in the same race as them.
So how do I combine the above three things to achieve the greatest results. It's simple really:
1. Enter lots of marathons. I am a big advocate of using marathons as very long tempo runs for ultras. A marathon can be put in to a training schedule with minimal disruption to the consistency you need for ultimate success. You can still race them, maybe up to around 85% to 90% effort without losing more than a day or two in to the following week for recovery. My desire to race is satisfied and I get a very good hard work out because I can't restrain myself from racing at least hard while being careful to avoid going flat out which usually hurts too much anyway unless you really really want it.
2. Pick and choose a small number of key ultra events to go for. Anything over 50 miles in distance is going to do you more harm than good, if that race is not your A race. A 50 miler as training for a 100, if done once and about 6 - 10 weeks out (depending on recovery time) is the most I should be doing. People that say they race 100s as training runs for other 100s, are delusional. You break your body down enormously over the course of a 100 miler. Being able to train consistently as opposed to having a 2 week taper, running a 100, then having 2 weeks to recover is obviously going to be more beneficial. With one caveat. If you do a longer race early enough, that can give you a huge dose of mental strength and endurance, instilling if you will the confidence that you can achieve your goal, then it might just be worthwhile. For me, for Sparta, having only run one 100+ mile race before (135 miles at BW), I need to know I can run the distance and I need to know I can do it well. I need to learn how to pace myself, how my body will cope with the last 45 miles when I am not walking along chaffed to pieces as I was in Death Valley. And in the process I get to run one of the other events on my bucket list.
So here's the plan:
January: Country to Capital - not too hard, not too gently, just right. About 7hrs would be good.
February: Rocky Raccoon 100 - Run it hard. Run a PB. Enjoy what will be my 4th go round at this event and most probably my last for quite a few years.
March: Ironman New Zealand - because I am in that part of the world and every now and then you need to go do something different. Six Foot Track Marathon the following weekend.
April: London Marathon - For me, my greatest achievement in running is breaking 3 hours in the marathon, because I raced it. Crawling out finishes at harder races is just so much less impressive. I would like to break 2:50 and have a chance with being in the front pen.
May: Grand Union Canal Run - The big one. The Spartathlon tester. Am I going to have what it takes 4 months down the line, to punch Leonidas in the face with my foot?
July: Hardrock - This is a lottery. I've been in it the last few years with no joy. If i get a place I would have to take it, apart from Sparta it's the only thing that's left to run off of my original bucket list.
September: All roads lead here. SPARTA.
So that's it really. Hardrock doesn't fit but apart from that it's lots of pretty flat running, fast running and nothing over 50 miles, apart from GUCR which fits for totally different reasons.
That leads to the following goals really, in this order, but numbered in priority:
2. Run a 100 mile PB at Rocky Raccoon in Feb.
5. Finish the Ironman without too bad of a melt down on the bike or drowning in the swim.
4. Run a PB at London.
3. Finish GUCR comfortably under 36 hours. Ideally under 30.
1. Finish Spartathlon.
As I've done in the past, I plan to blog each day between tomorrow and 2nd February for Rocky Raccoon. It's all for my own benefit so if you're one of the 8 people that found this blog and read this far, you might just be tempted to check back in and see how I'm doing.... and thank you for listening.
And here's the soundtrack to my winter already.
