Testing my marathon pace

One thing I realised lately was the bulk of my training has been on flat tracks. Budapest has some hilly areas, but somehow I never ventured into them too much. The same can't be said for our honeymoon/vacation back home in Portugal - the difficult thing is to find flat sections! From Lisbon to the Azores islands, through the mountains in the Algarve, you have great training possibilities.

Run in Ponta Delgada, São Miguel Island, Azores.

Run near Fonte do Bispo, Algarve - the rugest terrain ever?

The views are amazing and it really makes a difference from running in my usual urban environment. It's like the kilometers go past faster. Unfortunately, I don't take many pictures while out running, but that's something I'll try to change to make these posts a bit more interesting.

That leaves me with today's training. Needed to do some 15-16km at marathon pace but none of my usual routes hits that distance - they fall short or too long. So, I decided to be creative and add a Castle hill climb into my usual 10km route.


Funny thing that after almost 6 years living in Budapest, you still get surprised with roads that lead nowhere or at least not where you wanted to. This was the case, as climbing the staircase to the caste (and hitting the highest HR today - 160 bpm), I ended up in a courtyard in the middle of the castle with no exit, except the way I came in...and down the staircase...and forcing me to run uphill again somewhere else. So I sorta did 2 Castle hills today.

The rest of the run went pretty much uneventful. I did take the opportunity to run on the river bank road, which was closed to the traffic because of some construction works.

Ended up doing a bit faster than I set out to and finished strong as I usually do. The staircase in the beginning clearly slowing my pace down but overall kept around the 5:20 min/km.

Now, on to the market to buy veggies.

8 days to go...

8 days to go to my first marathon.

4 months of training. Hundreds (felt like thousands) of kilometers. At least 4 kilos of weight lost.

Through the weeks, feeling my body evolve and adapt to the pounding, surprising myself as I could put behind me increasingly longer distances. Rediscovering old favorites as great cross training exercises - swimming and cycling... and finding out many other things - that Yoga (Bikram) is one of the hardest things I've tried, that chocolate milk is a great recovery drink after training.

So, as I start to taper (and find myself with some time on my hands), time to recap the achievements during the build up and setting clear goals for the race itself.

I have many memorable moments during these 4 months, but 3 of them spring to mind: running with my wife for the first time (hurray for Bix!), running past the 3 hour mark non-stop for the first time in my life and running my second half marathon 3 weeks ago in 1:41 - shaving 25 minutes from my previous attempt...under 30ºC.

Goals. My main goal is to finish the marathon within 4 hours. Aiming at a pace no slower than 5:20/km. I know it'll be tough, but I'll give it a try. This pace is the average of my long runs, plus I think the better hydration, the motivation of the crowd and the cooling weather will help.

Time to go to bed now and for some rest. Have to keep a close check on my training the next few days as I'll be doing some traveling, meaning I can't lose any opportunity to hit the track/road for a light run. Swimming pool in front of the hotel will help the recovery, despite the fact it apparently only opens at lunch time and late afternoon/evening. Is it a French thing? A municipal pool thing? Both?

See you soon.