Valencia Marathon Training Log – Week 2

2023 Valencia Marathon Training

I will be posting up my weekly training updates for the 2023 Valencia Marathon. I did this for London back at the beginning of the year and I was requested to do this once again. London was blogged on A Heart for Running, and if you’re interested in reading it, follow the link. The weekly updates will go into detail, maybe more than anyone really needs, but it will show the type of detail I put into my coaching. Everything is taken into account to help ensure the best result on the day.

This will not be a full 16 week training programme as personal circumstances have prevented my training from starting on-time. Because of this, and multiple other reasons, my goal for Valencia is quite different from London. This also means that my approach to the training will be completely different. I hope this puts in perspective the difficulty of racing a marathon and it will hopefully show how things can change along the way. 

Week 2 of my Valencia Marathon training went a little better than week one. For the first time in 9 weeks, I see some hope of getting some of my energy back. I’m still pretty wrecked after a run, but recovery is taking a little less time. Towards the latter part of the week, I’ve felt the pace seem slightly more comfortable. These are very slight changes but it does give me confidence that things are on their way back.

Monday

Monday’s run was a 6 mile easy run. I managed it, but it was a struggle. The overall pace was 8:36/mile which was better than things have been, but it was way too much effort for an easy run. I should have ran by feel and kept the pace above 9:00/mile.

Tuesday

Tuesday’s run during week 2 of my Valencia Marathon training was a 5 mile progression. This was the first time in a very long time that I felt like I was striding out. It was still relatively slow, but my legs finally had some movement. The progression was rather unimpressive having started very slow, but it finished better: Mile by mile here were my splits:

9:34
9:22
8:55
8:23
7:19

Wednesday

No running today, just a couple of walks with doggo.

Thursday

7 miles easy. I took these at a better pace. I ran an overall pace of 8:59/mile and they felt better than Monday’s miles. It was an encouraging run.

Friday

4 miles steady and once again, day by day, things are improving. I managed a steady effort averaging 8:19/mile. Comfortably hard? Maybe bordering closer to hard than comfortably hard, but still, I’ll take it.

Saturday

Saturday’s run for my Valencia Marathon training was 5 miles steady. I took an extremely hilly route so although the pace was slow, it was still a steady effort. The hills where we are in Malaga are nothing like Fermanagh. These go straight up and down, nothing gentle about them. Overall pace was 8:45/mile.

Sunday

This was the most encouraging run of the week, and for the last 9 weeks. I ran a 15 miler under the beautiful warm sunshine. This was mostly along a beachside pathway through the town of El Rincon de la Victoria so the views were amazing. I ran these miles comfortably at an 8:37/mile pace. I had stamina and I never felt like I was pushing the pace.