Andrew Archive at Comrades Marathon Blog

Author Archive for Andrew

Weather forecast for Comrades

It’s never a huge concern, as it’s the middle of winter, so normally one could expect a fairly cold start, with it warming up quite a bit throughout the day.

Forecasts for Sunday, the 15th of June 2008:

Durban

Sunny – Min 11, Max 24

Fine.Wind light NW but moderate NE in the afternoon.

Sunrise: 06:49 Sunset: 17:03

Pietermaritzburg

Sunny – Min 5, Max 27

Fine.Wind light E. unrise: 06:51 Sunset: 17:06

So it looks to be a nice day for running. I hope to finish around 1pm, and it might be quite warm then, but otherwise should be fine. Will be monitoring it closely over the next few days.

Advice from a legend

There are many columnists penning their words about Comrades, Bruce Fordyce is arguably the most revered. His column with the Citizen has been excellent, and his last contains a very important bit of advice: Drive the course the day before.

I highly recommend, if you haven’t read them before, to go and have read of his previous columns:

Comrades Marathon Expo

As with any big race, the expo is a highlight for many runners. Expect to get many things at this expo, from pacing charts to anti-chafing cream. It’s a great place to meet other runners, chat to the official Comrades Coach and purchase some merchandise. It’s also the place to go and pick up your entry.

Tips for the Expo

  • Don’t wander around the expo for hours, especially if you’re going on Saturday. You’ll feel it the next day.
  • Try not to get conned by people selling “miracle” drugs/food that you’ve never tried before. That’s just asking for trouble.
  • Try and catch one of the route description talk. Take note of the hills during the first 35km.
  • Purchase an appropriate pacing chart, they cost R20 and proceeds go to charity.
  • It gets very cold at the start, while you’re waiting for the gun to go off. If you don’t have an old shirt to wear at the start, purchase a “throw a way” at the expo. This you can discard as you warm up.

Any more tips? Let me know in the comments.

Dates and Times for the Expo

12 June 2008 (Thursday) : 09h00 - 19h00

13 June 2008 (Friday)      : 09h00 - 19h00

14 June 2008 (Saturday)  : 09h00 - 17h00

Getting to the Expo

The 2008 expo is taking place at the Durban Exhibition Centre, on Walnut rd in Durban itself. It’s actually not far from the start of race on West street, outside the Durban City Hall. I’ve pasted a map below which should give an idea of where it is.

Time Trial-ling

Time Trials are quite popular here in South Africa, with many people believing in their ability to increase strength and speed. I’m not one of those people, I believe focused speedwork or hillwork is more effective in increasing speed. I still enjoy time trials though, and they are great in determining “where you are” with regard to fitness or speed.

So last night I headed out to run a time trial, a last flurry of the legs before Comrades. The goal was to run around 17:15, just under 3:30 min/km. That would be a 10 second PB.

I get to the start after a 10 minute warm up, thinking about a 3:25 first km split. The splits were:

  1. 3:27 - Good start
  2. 3:26 - Still feeling good, although I’m breathing heavily now.
  3. 3:21 - Great split, worked hard. HR up to 190 now.
  4. 3:28 - Traditionally when I lose the most time, so I worked hard here.
  5. 3:26 -  Excellent finish, but exhausted.

Total time: 17:10. Average HR was 183, maxed out at 191.

Very happy with the run, I know it’s only 5km, but it puts me in a good frame of mind for Comrades.

The Not So Frequent update

I’ve been very quiet, and with 11 days until Comrades, it’s time for me to update on what I’ve been up to. I though I’d compile a list of NSFAQ (Not so frequently asked questions) for the three of you that are interested:

Q: How’s the training gone since Two Oceans?

A: Well I took a week off training, basically just tried to recover. I slowly increased my mileage up to 120km a week, and now I’m tapering. I like graphs, so let me show you one:

April_May_KM

The above bar graph shows my weekly mileage divided up to into my different types of runs.

Q: What happened in the week 19 May to 25 May?

A: That was terrible. I got a stomach bug on the Monday, followed by a cold. Only managed to run three times, overdosing on Vitamin C seemed to work. I managed my long run fine though, which was 35km.

Q: Any highlights of the training so far?

A: A few. I ran a time trial 2 weeks after Two Oceans and got a PB of 17:25, which felt great. Another highlight was the Four Hills for Lindsay 56km training run. I completed this in 5 hours, and felt fantastic, a real confident booster.

Q: And lows?

A: Not that many, the combine long run and race on the 4th of May was quite tough. I ran the very hilly VWS 25km trail race followed by another 20km in howling wind and rain was quite testing. My 36km long run on the 13th of April was also tough, as I neglected to eat in the morning, and I started late.

Q: What is your total mileage for the year?

A: As of the 4th of June, I’m sitting on 1741km, so I think I’ve done just about enough. Would have liked closer to 1900, but rather be undertrained than overtrained as they say.

Q: What is your goal time?

A: 7:25, which would give me a silver. I’ll go into more detail in a future post.

Ok, so now that I’ve self indulged myself enough, please comment and tell me how your training is going, and how you are feeling about the big day. I would love to hear!