Murphy’s Lore
Murphy’s Lore
As Sam gears up for another marathon, her thoughts turns to…long runs
The long miles of marathon training offer plenty of time for thinking – and what I often find myself thinking about is… marathon training. I know, I know; I probably need to listen to a good podcast or find a running buddy, but on an easy run yesterday, I was trying to figure out what it is that sets marathon training apart from other race distances.
When you’re preparing for a marathon, it seems to live inside you, demanding your attention and respect, conjuring up fear and excitement and asking you questions that cannot yet be answered. Every training run seems loaded with significance, and how it goes determines whether you feel closer to or further from your destination. It’s like living on a snakes and ladders board.
That dreaded yet delicious unknown, I decided, is what gives the marathon its power. As running legend Haile Gebrselassie puts it, ‘ When you run a marathon, you run against the distance, not against the other runners, and not against the time.’ Train for a 10K or a half and you’ll probably run the full distance in training, albeit at a slower pace. But the marathon? No. It’s not until race day that you’ll truly know whether you measure up. And it matters not whether you’ve completed a marathon before or will be toeing the line for the first time. The uncertainty remains. Think of Paula Radcliffe’s famous DNF at the 2004 Athens Olympic Games or Callum Hawkins’ collapse at the Commonwealth Games in Australia last year, when he was just over a mile away from a gold medal.
A best guess, concerning whether our fitness is going up a rung or slithering down a slippery slope, is provided by the session that most closely mimics what we have to do on race day – which, in physiological parlance, is ‘get out there and run for a bloody long time.’ The long run. I love how it has acquired the definite article. We never talk of ‘ the speedwork’ or ‘ the tempo training’ but ‘ the long run’ has an import all of its own. It’s a training session that affects the day before (what should I eat? I better not have that third glass of wine) and the hours following (what can I eat next? Will anyone notice if I have a lie down?). Heck, it even requires sustenance along the way! A prolonged picnic in trainers, if you will.
There’s no doubting the importance of the long run to marathon success. One study found a correlation between finish time and the length of the longest run, as well as to the number of long runs over 20 miles. (Though it’s worth noting that even sub 2:30 runners didn’t exceed three of these.) Another found runners with a shorter ‘longest’ training run were more likely to hit the wall come race day.
I dread and relish the long run in equal measure. It looms over my week – something that must be conquered. I’ve devised mental tricks to cope with it, to break it down ( psychologically, at least) into digestible chunks. I’ve been dropped off a number of miles from home and run back, so that every step is a step closer to home; I’ve convinced myself a two-hour run performed as an hour out and an hour back is really a one-hour run, after which I simply have to get home. I’ve even done a five-mile warm-up before a 15-mile long run. (See what I did there?)
If a long run feels harder than it should – when paces are not met, or distances not reached – it weighs heavily on my shoulders and fills me with uncertainty. But when it goes to plan, nothing beats it: 15 miles done. 18 miles done. 20 miles done. Bam!
As we marathoners launch into what’s become widely known as Monster March – the peak mileage month for spring races – our thoughts will become increasingly occupied with the vexed question of how we’ll measure up on race day.
But, as Joe Henderson, running and coaching veteran and author, reminds us, ‘ You can never be sure. It’s what makes the marathon both fearsome and fascinating.’ And, for me, anyway, so hard to resist.