Greetings all, special hello to Alf as I believe you passed your virus on to me this past week :-).
Quite an amazing and eventful week for me - off the track rather than on it. The nasty headcold (had fever and sweats on Wed and Thurs nights) and life events impacted negatively on running.
Sun: 25km, 2.14 (starting to get sick)
Mon: 35min
Tues: 4 x 5mins@4.10 pace with grp of my Masters guys running Paris this weekend.
Wed: 19km, 1.40
Thurs. quite sick started the track session and after an 85sec quarter just didnt recover in the float and stepped off. (11km total with jogging either side)
Fri: 10km feeling lot better
Sat: 15km (5km warmup, 5km hill fartlek, 1km jog down hill, 4km tempo on flat). My European variation of the session we did with AIS squad in Stromlo Forest, Canberra "back in the day". HR was highest Ive seen it in years on some of the hard hills (176bpm). A decent work after a crappy week.
100km in total. no doubles and no core or achilles rehab. Too busy and/or unwell/slack.
Now to ife events. As I left for my Sunday run, a came across a chap who had appeared to have just had a cardiac arrest. As first on seen I did my due diligence and began CPR as there was no pulse. Another from our group arrived and called paramedics who arrived quickly. After 35mins the attempt to revive him was terminated. The long was was rather solemn after that start.
Sunday I was coming down with the virus and went to bed at about 8pm feeling quite unwell. At midnight my wife woke me to say that she was starting to have contractions..... I rested as much as I could over the next hours. At 6am wife suggested that if i was planning to run today I should go now :-). jogged 35mins and we then went to hospital. At 17.34 on April 1st our son was born.
An intense experience and the life-death nexus I had witnessed over the previous day and half left me rather emotionally drained. Week was spent trying to work, survive my cold, and spend as much time at the clinic with my new family.
I'd wager most on this thread are at the opposite end of their parenting duties to me... and think I'm crazy ;-). its all new (our first child) and I guess running will be pushed further into the background for awhile. Life is never dull it seems.
Anyways, I am being self indulgent and for any who read this far, thanks for indulging me.
In relationship to the question around focussing on 5k training to run a better marathon I've always found and felt that most recreational athletes and many elite athletes actually run a better 5km after marathon training. Echoing sentiments by others above, most folks run more mileage and more tempos/threshold run during marathon training which results in them being aerobically "fitter" and more efficient. GreteHund you have good speed with those 400s and 200s you posted - Id imagine though you must be having a longish recovery? My experience is that for improving distance performances, running the 400s slower and having a shorter and/or float recovery is more effective and replicates racing.
Have a good week all and again sorry for personal rant.