My journey as a marathoner...

Club Feature: Greater Boston Track Club By Barbara Huebner Resource Guide 2004, Vol. 11, No. 5 American Track & Field It was early on a Thursday morning in April 1977 when Randy Thomas aimed his '76 Toyota Celica down Route 2 toward Boston. Two of his Greater Boston Track Club teammates would be waiting in a parking lot on Route 128 for Thomas to collect them on the way to the Penn Relays, where they would compete that night. But a wheel bearing broke, and Thomas was two, maybe three hours late and $170 in repairs poorer by the time he reached his passengers. With only $30 in his pocket and no margin for error in getting to Philadelphia, they hit the road again, made it to the meet on time, barely, and all ran PRs. After a night of sleep in a shared hotel room, made into a triple courtesy of a mattress on the floor, the guys woke to an inspiration: let's stay another night so we can watch the meet tomorrow. Yeah, I know we don't have enough money left but let's do i...

Appendix from Charlie's Spedding's book - From Last to First 1984 training log from May 13th (won London Marathon in 2:09:57) to August 12th (3rd at Olympic Marathon in 2:09:58) APPENDIX The following is an exact copy of my training diary from the London marathon to the Olympic marathon. After each week I have added comments to explain my reasoning. May 13th Mon 14th Tues 15th Wed 16th Thur 17th Frid 18th Sat 19th Sun 20th London Marathon 1st in 2:09:57 too stiff to run rest 4 miles easy run 5 Miles steady run 5 Miles steady run 6 Miles steady run 10 miles in 65 minutes I ran only thirty miles this week because I was mentally drained and my legs were very sore. Steady running for me was about 6 minutes per mile, and an easy run was 7 minutes per mile or slower. Mon 21st Tues 22nd Wed 23rd Thur 24th Fri 25th Sat 26th Sun 27th 7 miles steady run 9 miles steady run 7 miles steady run 5 miles steady run am. 5 miles steady pm. 6 miles easy 7 miles including 12x100 yard strides wi...

Why do Short Hills Why do I do short hill repeats if I'm training for a marathon and not a mile? I do short hill repeats for 2 reasons the first goal, and most obvious, is to gain physical strength. Since strength is in our sport is often interchangeable with speed I see why it seems strange for a marathoner to be doing this type of a workout especially with such frequency. I mean why try to get a faster top end speed when even to run a world record I only need to run 4:45 or 4:46 a mile. The first reason is that every race is a race of speed, meaning that no matter how long the race is the fastest person over the distance wins. But that alone doesn't justify hill repeats one to three times a week. The real reason is strength and speed over the short distance equal efficiency. By doing these hills and getting stronger and faster in the maxim. I teach my body to consume less glycogen, and less oxygen when moving at sub maximal speeds. The less of these "fuels" the body...