Thirteen weeks ago I started training for Bournemouth Marathon with a lot of hopes and goals for what was to come. But when it comes down to it, if I had one wish for this marathon training cycle it would be this: make it through training without picking up an injury. And it looks like I’ve succeeded.

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Last long run – dress rehersal

As I ran round Victoria Park midway through my long run on Saturday I passed a guy wearing a Nike T-shirt that said “NO PAIN NO GAIN” on the front. I smirked to myself. That hasn’t been my experience this training cycle. My marathon training has been without pain and, whatever happens on race day, I’ve already seen lots of gains.

This training cycle has seen me running more miles on more days and at faster speeds than I have for any previous marathon I’ve trained for. For the past few weeks I’ve clocked up 50 miles a week, I’ve run six days a week and I’ve enjoyed every run. Some have been pretty challenging – that 10 mile tempo run at race pace at 7am before work, I’m looking at you – and it has meant lots of early starts to fit all the runs into my week. But it has been worth it.

On Saturday I did my last long run. Contrary to a lot of people’s marathon training methods, my longest runs have been 16 miles. Last year, training for London I ran 20 miles a couple of times and it took me far too long to recover after. I hobbled around and was zonked out on the sofa for most of the weekend. It didn’t make sense to me that I had to get into that state before a race, and race day didn’t go so well anyway. So this time I chose not to.

Instead I chose to run 16 miles at a good pace, to throw in some race pace miles and do it off the back of a lot of miles midweek. I chose to smile the whole way round, feel confident and strong and finish feeling I could have kept going. A lot of people say that they need to hit 20 miles in training to give them confidence for race day – my confidence will come from running strong, not running far.

It’s not for everyone, but I’ve chosen to do what works for me. Far too often we look at what other people are doing and think that we should be doing the same rather than finding what works best for ourselves. My friend Cathy has been following a similar training strategy to mine and has written a very good blog about the ins and outs of it.

After that last long run, I put on my compression tights, went out for Thai food and then went to bed before getting up to take part in Run To The Beat 10k on Sunday.

Sure Run To The Beat 2015

Sure Run To The Beat 2015

It was an undulating 10k race round Wembley with music at various points round the course and a friendly atmosphere. I’d been invited to take part as a guest of Brooks Running and thought it would be a good way to celebrate the start of my marathon taper.

I’d done Run To The Beat a couple of years ago when it was a half marathon in Greenwich. I hadn’t really enjoyed it back then but this weekend’s race was a huge improvement. There was plenty of space to run, nobody was in so much of a hurry that they were cutting other people up and there was a good mood throughout. I grabbed my medal and some water and then headed off to the station, clocking up another two miles on the way to finish off my running week.

So that’s all the hard work done, three weeks of tapering and a holiday to go before we see if it’s going to get me that 3:30 time. If it doesn’t, I can’t say I have any regrets. I’ve enjoyed the past 13 weeks. It hasn’t felt like a massive struggle and, if I had to choose, I’d choose 13 weeks of great running over one perfect race. But hopefully I can have both.

If you’ve missed my musings on this marathon training cycle, you can catch them all here:
UPDATES: ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR.