Hansons Marathon Method - Review in Progress - Day 15 of 123

Wow, that was harsh.

So this Thursday was our first stab at a tempo day on the Hansons Advanced Marathon Method. Also, the next 14 Thursdays will be tempo days. God, that hurts me just to type it.

On the Hansons plan, tempo days are pretty simple: run at your goal marathon pace. Period. For me, to hit the 3:25 I need for Boston, that's a 7:50 pace.

So today I had a 6 mile tempo run, with a mile warmup and a mile cooldown. Eight miles total.

Here's what it looked like:



So, let's take it mile by mile:

Mile one: just warming up. I was a little creaky after not running at all yesterday (yes, the rest days are actually sort of hard on my body - who knew?) Hit a 9:17 pace. Whatever. That's fine.

Mile two: flipped the switch and came in at a 7:51. Perfect.

Mile three: I was actually looking pretty good here until the end of the mile when I hit a fairly short, but steep, hill. I am not in good enough shape to keep at 7:50 going uphill. It just isn't going to happen.

Mile four: I don't even know what to say here. This mile was pretty much uphill, with a steep section in the middle. Still...9:20!?! I don't know. I can't explain it. I should be able to get under 9:00 pace no matter what.

Mile five: got over the hill, clearly. And had some downhill on this section, clearly. I even tried to hold back a bit on this mile, but downhill is downhill.

Mile six: basically a flat section. I'm OK with a 7:58 pace. Really, anything under 8:00 would be close enough for me at this point. It's the third week - there will be plenty of time for splitting hairs later.

Mile seven: last mile of the tempo section and I hit it perfectly at 7:49. Nice way to wrap it up.

Mile eight: I cut it a little short just because I was at my house, and hey, I was tired.

So I'm fairly happy with this. Except for mile four, it went about as expected. I'll have to hunt a little harder next Thursday for a flat six-mile section...with no stop lights. It's harder than you'd think, since I really don't want to run six miles around a track. What is that, 24 laps? No thanks.

My legs are pretty tired and sore right now. Tomorrow's run will be a real test of the Hansons cumulative fatigue theory.

See you tomorrow.

Go buy the book: