Hi all, welcome back to my “Road to Spijkenisse - SPARK Marathon 2025”, in which I take on the challenge to break my 3:20:16 Marathon PR with a 8 week trainingsprogram.
After an intense 5 days, I decided to make a small adjustment in my trainingsplan. My Saterday 30 min recovery pace became family time and an opportunity to give the legs complete rest.
Sunday morning
Setting the alarm at 06:30, waking up, getting dressed and relaxing with a coffee. Then preparing my camelback with 2x 0,5l of water with electrolytes and a few energy gels (took 4 isotonic and 1 with a caffeine boost with me). Before hitting the road at 07:30.
While traditionally the long runs are mostly zone 2 (slower) runs, I felt that the day off made me feel strong, so I decided to go for a decently paced zone 3 run. Heading outside, it was still raining quite a bit - but that was ok => if you are wet, you are wet so I just don’t really bother. I decided to run to go to Rotterdam Krallingen , which features a little lake and a small forest. To go there I crossed some if the older parts of the city
When I was in the forest area the rain had stopped and a nice sun came up for the early birds.
I sticked to my nutrition plan for most of the run, alternating drinks and gels every 10 minutes and I felt strong maintaining a 4:35-4:45 / minute pace without any trouble.
After the forest area I decided to do a lap around the lake. While it had stopped raining, the strong wind blew quite some water into my face - which at that point was refreshing!
Finishing the lake, put me around 20km in after which I headed back home (another 7km) where I focussed on maintaining pace and posture. I decided to skip the last 2 energy gels as I felt strong enough to finish it strong without any additional boost (hoping it would benefit my fat burning a little).
Overall, fun long run with perfect weather conditions!
Happy running
Nicely done running today! Sounds like it was nice getting out early despite the rain, but once you were in the forest and the sun came out it must have been nice. That's a pretty good paced run you put in and gets stronger, that much closer to beating your record in the marathon.
It really is funny as we get older nutrition really is so important. When I was in sports when I was younger no one focused on nutrition, but now they start indoctrinating athletes early on. It's a different than I grew up in, that's for sure!
Great job, and those pictures are gorgeous. What a great place to run!
Haha yeah, I am also quite amazed by the influence of science (and marketing) on running - nutrition, super shoes and clothing. Also crazy that the ultra runners mostly run on solid foods (nerds, gummy bears, clif! Cookies) - while marathon runners need $20 - $50 take of nutrition on a single marathon.
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que paisajes tan hermosos!
Thank you, yeah just at the outside of Rotterdam there is surprising beautiful nature!
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