Just under five weeks to go until the Taunton marathon, and the long runs are getting…. well…long.
Last year’s Edinburgh marathon was my first for 12 years, and it was really a test of faith. I’d long ago accepted that my marathon days were over, and I didn’t quite believe I could still do it. Until I did.
Edinburgh taught me a lot about my running. Just being able to complete each new milestone in training seemed like an achievement, even though my form had a habit of deteriorating as the distances got longer. I knew I wasn’t holding my posture over the whole run, because I felt crunched up like a pretzel by the time I finished. And the ache in my quads said I was still using my legs too much.
With Taunton, my goal is to enjoy the marathon, not just endure it. With my first 50K race coming up in the autumn, I want to run 26.2 miles feeling relaxed and using as little effort as possible. And to finish it with something left in the tank.
So long runs have been my chance to test, experiment, practice. To iron out the wrinkles in my ChiRunning technique, and to find the tips and tricks that will really help me stay relaxed and aligned, with minimal effort, throughout.
Here are three of the focuses that have worked most effectively for me during my marathon training runs:
Staying tall
As I become tired, I tend to slump. And as alignment collapses, so it gets harder to relax my leg muscles.
It takes focus and a bit of mental effort to lift up tall in the latter stages of a 20+ mile run, but the difference is immediate. I feel lighter, tension drains out of my lower back, and my legs can just let go.
Visualising a balloon tied to the top of my head, pulling me up and lengthening my spine from tailbone to crown, really helps to give me the ‘lift’ I need.
Sharing the workload
Like many runners, I carry a lot of tension in my shoulders – too much time spent hunched over laptops and tablets. I used to get pains across my upper back and shoulders on long runs from muscles wound way too tight.
When you run, you want your upper body to share the workload, which means the arms need to be able to swing free and relaxed. Tricky with tight, tense shoulders.
Consciously letting go of the shoulders and feeling them drop, allowing the arms to swing rearward, helps everything to relax and takes the load off my legs. My speed increases, while I feel as though I’m working less hard.
Feeling that swing
In trying to minimize effort on my runs, I’ve been focusing a lot on improving my pelvic rotation. This is an advanced ChiRunning technique, which increases fluidity and speed, without increasing effort.
When I trained for Edinburgh, I was plagued by tight hamstrings on my long runs. This time around, with better pelvic rotation, my hammies have behaved themselves impeccably.
Tuning into and relaxing the lower back, while letting the leg take the hip with it as it swings to the rear, allows pelvic rotation to happen naturally. And imagining that my legs end at the knees not only helps get those hips swinging, but stops my calves tightening and keeps lower legs limp and loose.
Using techniques like these has made my training for Taunton a very different experience. While legs have been tired at the end of a long run, there have been no aches and pains, no soreness the next day, and recovery has been much quicker.
And now just a little over 30 days of training left to go, I’ll soon have the chance to try them out on race day. Wish me luck!