Sunday, March 1, 2009

Taper time again...

Yesterday's long run signaled the start of the taper period leading into my next race. A hilly off-road 45km ultramarathon. Usually not my happiest time as it usually brings around a lot of self-doubt and worries that I haven't done enough or perhaps I have done too much or.... well you get the idea!

My plan is to follow what worked for before the Cities Marathon in July last year but with a few tweaks here and there with my training. I'm going into this event a little under-trained compared to last time so I'm going to try and hold a little more volume in the first week before a big reduction in race week volume trying to freshen up.

Training plan:

sun - 36k in 2:40 (1:20 out/1:20 back) - already run
mon - 1h easy + 6 x short fast hills
tue - 20' warmup + 3-4 x 3k MP-LT + 1 x 2k fast (am) // 1h easy (pm)
wed - 45' easy (am) // 16k w/ 8k @ MP (noon)
thu - 90' easy (am)
fri - 13k w/ 10k MP
sat - 1h easy + 12k MP or 5 x 2k LT
sun - 90' easy
mon - 45' easy (am) // 1h w/ 4 x 1200m @ LT + 6 x 100m hill sprints (noon)
tue - 8k w/ 5k MP
wed - 6k w/ 3k MP
thu - REST
fri - 20-30' easy w/ last 2.5' fast/ 30" flat out (before carb load)
sat - RACE

Taper Diet:

- 9 days carb depletion
- 2 days start adding carbohydrates while reducing protein and fats
- 1 day carb load (10-12g carbohydrates per kg of bodyweight)

During the carb depletion phase I'll eliminate all carbohydrates except for a small amount in the post-exercise window following longer and hard workouts to allow for some glycogen replacement to provide for some recovery between sessions.

Pretty much the same taper program as last time which I felt worked and I hope will give me a similar result in two weeks time.

I'll try and post a daily account of my training, diet and thoughts leading up to race day as I did in the past.

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