Sunday, April 22, 2012

Chucka...Chucka...Chucka Knox

The time has come for me to dare myself to taper for Ice Age.  There is a tendency on my part to want to squeeze a bit more in.  I am starting to believe tapering for a 50 mile can be a bit different than tapering for a marathon.  Seems to me one has done a few 4-6 hour runs and the process may take longer.  I rarely ran more than 3 hours in marathon training.  I usually choose to emphasize on pace work and hard medium long runs for marathons.  The general thought was to run 75%, 50%, and 25% of average mileage the final three weeks.

The logs have revealed something entirely different.  There is credible evidence I may do better with much less than this.  One example is 2009 when I ran a 7:20 at Ice Age.  It was more like 50%, 50%, and 17%.  I am under the impression if I do too much 3 weeks out then a full taper may not occur.  Age is a part of it as well.

I say age, because as I watch runners 10-20 years younger than me they simply do recover quicker.  Like some, I tend to believe the rule does not apply to me.  I have confirmed this thought is wrong and I will need to make alterations.  There are days when I feel solid and other days it is drudgery.  Since there isn't much I can change 3 weeks out from Ice Age, the one thing I can do is rest properly.  I thought about getting in a solid effort of 60 miles next week, but I think I'll be in the 40s.

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