Before Berlin Marathon, where I was hoping to run the Olympic standard, the month leading up to the race was tough. I was very excited about the race – it’s still a privilege to race in one of the biggest marathons in the world – but I definitely had a feeling of “this has to go well”. I was doing everything in my power to make the weeks leading up to the race go perfectly. The execution of the training is the easy part. After that comes the tricky part. Recovering from the work so you can actually absorb the training and get fitter. This means being on top of your nutrition and hydration, your sleep, and everything that can impact your recovery. I tried to avoid getting sick by isolating myself a bit. When my buddy PJ dropped me off at the airport to fly to Berlin, I wore a mask the whole drive, as well as on the plane. I was constantly looking for ways to minimize the risk of derailing my preparation. It was mentally exhausting.
Right now, I’m training as hard as before Berlin, but the perspective is different. My mindset shifted from “I have to…” to “I get to…“. That doesn’t mean I don’t take my training and recovery as serious as for every marathon. It means I’m not taking it too far. Before Berlin, trying to control all those things tired me out mentally, possibly even impacting my recovery by not being able to relax that well. I learned from the Berlin build, and I’m able to let go of things a bit better. Some things are just out of our control. I’m going to focus on doing my training, eating well and prioritizing sleep, as well as connecting with the people that have supported me through this long but worthwhile journey.
Training-wise, I’m really in the thick of it at the moment. The volume is high, and the specific marathon sessions are starting to ramp up. It’s good that my coach’s here with me again, because we’re definitely walking the fine line between planned fatigue and overdoing it. I feel it’s still under control, though. This is usually how I’ve felt between 6 and 3 weeks before the marathon. I’m still able to do well in my workouts, but on easy recovery runs, my legs feel heavy and the body is tired. During my long run on Sunday, I almost called it quits after 10km, because I was just not feeling it. My legs felt sluggish, every hill was tough and my stomach was aching. I’m happy I didn’t, because after a while it started to feel better, and I was able to finish my biggest week of training ever!
At this point in the preparation, I’d normally be doing lots of work around marathon pace, really focusing on hitting the exact splits I want to run during the marathon. Mostly, this has been between 3’00” and 3’05” per kilometer, and making the blocks longer as we get closer to the race. But this time, we’re switching from marathon pace to marathon effort. We’re trying to feel the effort on more hilly routes, as the Paris course will be very hilly. This way of approaching a workout makes it a lot easier mentally. I don’t have to stress out when I’m not really hitting the pace I was prescribed, because it’s hard to compare a hilly run with a flat one. I go into the workout more freely, seeing what my body can do on the day. It has one huge advantage. You learn to really feel how your body’s responding. When you’re too focused on exact pace, you might hammer the run just to hit the right splits, but usually this makes the workout tougher than anticipated. Letting go of the pace, focusing on how your body’s feeling at that moment, is the best way to execute the workout like it was actually planned. The information we’re gaining out of those runs will be hugely important during the Olympic Marathon, because the summer heat and the hills will make it a marathon like no other!
