"Special Block" weekend wrap

Leading up to the Tokyo Marathon in Feb, I trialled some of Renato Carnova's theories. One of his ideas includes a "special block" of back to back hard runs. He prescribes that it should be undertaken on the same day AM & PM. Carnova's approach is also very much event specific. Marathoners will do intervals up to 24 km's in total, 1/2 marathon runners 12-15 km's & 10,000 runners 10-12 km's. These sessions are tough, but the pacing is undertaken at around goal race pace, so despite the longer accumulation of intervals, the sessions are very manageable. The "special block" session is done a few weeks out from race day. The next few days afterwards are very easy.  An example of the marathon  "special block" prescribed for his Kenyan elites is as follows:

AM - 10 km's at 90% of race pace, followed by 20 km's at race pace.

PM - 10 km's at 90% of race pace, followed by 10 x 1000 at race pace (floating 1000 recovery at 90% of race pace).

At the time I decided the above is a big ask for a modest 2:40 marathoner, so I abbreviated the first run to just 15 km's at marathon intensity, but I did do the full second one. It was certainly a character building exercise. I actually felt better during the second hard run. Whilst I wouldn't attribute this one session in isolation to me finally cracking 2:39, I will say that I gained a lot of confidence from it. 

I would say if anybody is interested in Carnova's methods, you need to really understand the complete plan.. In any program, no session alone is important, the combination of many sessions is the key. Carnova is all about building the athlete for the whole event. So marathoners will do a lot of long intervals, but every other week or thereabouts will do solid paced long runs up to 45 km's. might sound hard, but rejuvenation days are plentiful to compliment the full plan.

Anyway, I've digressed. This weekend for me has been about a 1/2 marathon specific modified "special block". Yesterday (3 pm) I did State XC at Willandra (12 km's over challenging sharp undulating terrain). Today (7:30 AM) I did the SMC 10 km race.

Both races went okay. Time  and pacing wasn't really a key for me. I felt a little underdone at Willandra and managed a time of 44:53, for 36th overall and 2nd M45. The downhill as always was my big weakness. Today was a solo effort for an unflattering time of 35:53. Closer to 35 would've been nice, but coming off a hard XC and only 5 hours sleep was less than ideal. The SMC course is on a bike path and includes 1 fairly big hill where I could only manage a 3:43 km, but the rest of the race went okay. Importantly I was running on at the end with a couple of 3:28 closing km's. I don't get many wins, so it was nice to get one today.

The next 3 days will be very easy for me. Will do another run this afternoon and will do my long run probably on Tuesday. Come Thursday, hopefully I'll be refreshed and pumped for some hard shorter reps.

2 weeks now until the Gold Coast 1/2.