Despite all the gains I’ve made using The Cool Impossible I decided to change training plans from this week until Rock n Roll Liverpool to give me a training plan more tailored to my marathon goal rather than the general training program The Cool Impossible provides. This decision is arguably a bit of a risk and I didn’t take the decision lightly, but there were three main reasons I decided to change up training:

1. Phase 2 of The Cool Impossible is mainly about speed, with short, fast intervals and shorter long runs at a higher intensity. As I’ve gained a lot of speed through Phase 1 I felt I was in a good place pace-wise, but still needed to improve endurance.
2. Continuing with Phase 2 would have meant hitting the marathon with still about a month of Phase 2 left to complete. Changing the plan means I can tailor the run in to the marathon on the areas I feel need improvement and still taper sensibly.
3. Changing training means I can keep the long runs long. Phase 2 of The Cool Impossible involves very aggressive speed training that would probably have left me struggling trying to maintain 3 hour long runs.

I’ll definitely be coming back to Phase 2 of The Cool Impossible and will be straight on it after I’ve recovered from the marathon, but for now I’m going to use a tailored plan based on sessions in Alberto Salazar’s Guide to Road Racing. This means working to the following weekly plan:

• 1 x long run of around 3 hours every week
• 1 x Heart Rate Zone 2-3 run of 1 hour every week
• 2 x medium / long interval sessions every week – Yasso 800s, Tempo runs, 9 mile fartleks, etc.
• 2-3  x slow 25-30 minute recovery runs working on cadence

Week 14 Stats

Cross Training

• 2 x  1 hour Strength Training
• 1 x 45 mins TRX Class