Homecoming

April 29, 2019

A few people have already guessed this announcement: I’m planning on running Ottawa Marathon on May 26th!

In my last blog I wrote how I was pulling out of the Hamburg marathon because I was behind in my training. It was an easy decision for me because I knew that if I could get quickly back into training then I’d have plenty of time to prepare for Ottawa. When I was scheduling a Spring marathon my five possibilities were Hamburg, London, Prague, Ottawa and Boston. It made sense to race at the end of April because we planned a Feb/Mar/Apr training camp/vacation and Hamburg had a good pace option for me. But when that date was out the window it was a no-brainer to pick Ottawa.

After a couple of relatively low-key workouts in early April to get back into the groove things started to click again. I had a solid 60′ marathon-effort on April 19th (with coach DST following in a car with bottles) and then a few days ago I ran 4 x 5km and was pumped to have averaged 15:52. I’ve been running my fartlek sessions and long-runs with the Boulder Harriers and those have gone well, having people to push me has been very valuable. I’ve averaged about 180km/week the past four weeks and that seems to be my sweet spot these days. With one month until Ottawa I’m happy where my fitness is.

4 x 5km on the “Honda Loop” in Boulder

10 years ago I ran my debut marathon in Ottawa (2:17:09). I’ve always wanted to head back but I’ve actually only run four Spring marathons since then (2013 Rotterdam DNF, 2014 London 2:13, 2015 Rotterdam 2:11, 2018 Boston 2:25 9th place). It’s funny to think how green I was to the marathon in 2009. The thing I remember most is being very curious as to what the final 12 kilometres were going to feel like, (spoiler: it hurt!!). I’d say my race in Ottawa was a success as I hit my goal (qualified for 2009 World Champs) and wanted to race another marathon. I’m heading back to Ottawa with a good feeling about the race.

Some funny things I wrote down 10 years ago in my post-Ottawa blog: The most I ran in a single week leading up to Ottawa was 145km. I only had two days where I ran twice in the same day, (but many days had a second x-trainign session). I only planned racing the marathon 6.5 weeks before race day. Due to breaking my foot the previous November, I only ran 96 of the 168 days leading up to the race and my first running workout was March 29th.

2009 Ottawa Marathon

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I finally made it to the infamous Magnolia Road last weekend for a long-run. It reminds me a lot of the hilly dirt roads around Iten, Kenya. Even though they are dirt roads the undulation beats your legs up plenty. Great marathon preparation and great views.