Week 8 - Long run

I have a question in regards to the Week 8 long run.

Since this is my second run through on the Foundation Program, I started with a bit more of a base than before.

With the Week 1 long run being 15 minutes longer than the longest run I had done in the previous 2-3 weeks, I ended up doing a 2 hours 25 minutes run for Week 1, since I was doing some slow 21km runs with a mate in the preceding weeks.

This of course meant I was hitting some big mileage early on, with Week 6's run going for 3hrs 25 mins, and a distance of 39km's. With Week 7's instruction of not exceeding 3 hours on the long run, I cut back to the 3 hours and got about 35km's done.

With the rest/recovery week for Week 8, the program says I should do the same as Week 5, but that would mean doing a 3 hour 10 min run, longer than Week 7, and on a rest/recovery week!?!

Should I just go back to a 2 hour 30 minute run for this Week 8 long run?

Let me know your thoughts and opinions.

Cheers

1 member likes this

▶ Reply to This

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Patrick Garrick on April 8, 2015 at 9:25am

In my experience, the recovery week long runs end up being about 60-70% of the time of the previous week's long run. If you plan on sticking with with Eric's 3 hour max recommendation going forward, that would equate to about a 2 hr run.

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Francis Flynn on April 9, 2015 at 1:40am

Good Morning Shayne,

That's an interesting question, for me I would take it literally as I intemperate the book and go for the 2hr 30min irrespective of what you have done before. I can see your dilemma though.... but it is a rest and recovery week so enjoy it. I'm in week 8 also as its my first time at the CI last week 7 long run was a total time of 3 hours and 30.5km, it was a challenging week.

Good luck

Frank

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Robert Burpee on April 11, 2015 at 3:23pm

Hi Shayne, I agree with both Frank & Patrick. To me week 8 is a recovery week so use it as such. By your own admition you have a good base so enjoy the recovery week backing your off a bit. Rest & recovery is an integral part of getting stronger & faster.
Hope I've helped. Robert