Week 6

Somehow a very solid week of training....

MON: 16km last run in Australia... it was really windy so on the way back after 8k it was no more  "easy" effort

TUE: in Hong Kong. in the evening, I showed up at the track of the Sport Institute for a workout with the "national team".
The new national team coach did a very smart move to set-up bi-weekly training session for his team and to also allow "qualified guests" to join into the workout.
It makes a lot of sense because otherwise there would be only 3-4 people training at each session and also the foreigners in HK are really a big push and motivation for improvement to local runners...
So at the session, there were some of the best local runners and also few foreigners (including me...).
That said, the session was schedule for a 30' tempo run...
for me, 3 days after an half marathon, it was a bit hard, but I decided to stick to the HR monitor and let the effort guide the pace.
It was very pleasant because, rather than running alone, it was a good pack all along the effort and I clocked 3'30"/k pace very steady, closing in 8800m for 30'. HR was right on spot into the 170s as it should be for me for a tempo run.
Note: I would never been able to do 30' tempo run on a track alone... group power...

WED: no running
THU: easy 14.5k
FRI: same as yesterday..
SAT: 16k with 5-6 hill sprints

SUN: kind of last long run/marathon rehearsal. Maybe is not really a good training concept to do a Marathon Pace long run only one week before a real marathon, but I wanted to see how my target pace felt like and also to test all the "materials".
By the way, it was a perfect day for running fast, with 12C, slight wind and rain.
So I was really happy also to test running with leg warmers to use in case of real cold...
4k easy, the 3x a undulating circuit of 7k, 3k cool down
On the first lap I felt really good and I went a bit faster than I wanted... maybe around 3'55"/k average.
Then 2 laps at MP effort and I was glad to see that I clocked 3'45" /3'48" pace.
After 14km of MP I was still in my planned HR zone even after a hard week of training...
Let's see on race day, but running at 3'50" might be possible.
total: 27km @3'58" average pace (including w/u and c/d)

Total weekly: 100k sharp... not bad.
Now time to taper down for the Marathon