I'm tanking at the end of my long run. Help!! (Read 1591 times)

Perhaps you are running too fast? Or too many miles for your fitness level. Are you using gels or other energy supplements...when? Make your log visible and it will be easier for peeps to give you input.

My goal time is based on the fact that I did a half last year in 2 hrs so 2 hours X 2 plus some extra time seemed reasonable. I have opened up my log. This is my first post, so I did not even know I had the log closed. Thanks for the input.

My goal time is based on the fact that I did a half last year in 2 hrs so 2 hours X 2 plus some extra time seemed reasonable. I have opened up my log. This is my first post, so I did not even know I had the log closed. Thanks for the input.

That's VERY similar to my stats (my HM PR is 2:04:03). I will be running my first full this Fall and am figuring on under 4:30 if I am well-trained and have a good race. Most of the calculators figure my finishing in 4:15-4:20, but I think that's pretty optimistic, really. How many miles are you doing/week...what sort of progression of mileage from week-to-week?

I have opened up my log.

I still don't see the link...go into your log preferences (in options at top right) and click on the "Allow everyone to see my running log" radio button.

If this is the first time you've gone this distance, your body may just be going "what the hey????" When I was training for my marathon I was fine until my long runs reached about 14 miles. After that, whenever I extended my miles I was fine until I'd reached my previous maximum long-run distance, but I'd soon die during the extension. When I ran my first 16 miler, for example, I was fine for the first 14 miles (a distance I'd run before) but cratered during miles 15 and 16. I thought it was just the fact that I was asking my body to do something it hadn't done before, and it just needed convincing that it could do it. I'm currently back up to 16 miles for my max long runs getting ready for a half-marathon a couple of years after my last full. I'm in better shape now with a larger base. I still saw the same effect the first time I reached 16 a couple of weeks ago, but it wasn't as significant as it was during my marathon training.

I am training for my 1st marathon in mid April too ( but am slower than you. ) I do just over half my miles during the week, and just less than half as a long run. Maybe if you did more miles mid week it would give you a better base?

Easy. You aren't running enough between your long runs--so there's way too much stress on one day of the week, and way too little stress on the other days. It's not an optimal way to train, at all. This is a common mistake with beginning runners training for the marathon--you think that to prepare for a really long run, you have to run really long. What you need to do is to figure out how to run a lot. And that means spreading out your volume over the entire 7 days of the week. You're much better off running every day and thinking about your training as maximizing the miles run per week than by focusing on one longer run every 7 days. As a general rule, if your long run is more than 35% of your weekly mileage, you're not training optimally.