Question:
I am considering doing Boston Marathon later this year with some
friends from university. I was wondering if anyone else had done it
before (I did it 2 years ago in a not very good 4x) and actually
trained properly for it. What sort of training did you do for it? We
were thinking mainly of long, low rate ergos at UT2/UT1 and then a week
of training together in the boat, doing longer and longer outings until
we hit about 40km. After that we thought we should be able to push
beyond the 40km to the full distance of 50km on the actual day. Also,
what have other people done about taking in food along the way?
Answer:I've done it more times than I care to remember, mainly in the single, =6th
overall in 1999 was probably my best result.
Training wise, I did mostly UT2 in the boat with outings in the 1 - 1 1/2
hour range, although I'd try to do a 2 - 2 1/2 hour piece about a week or so
before. On the erg I'd do 20 or 25k UT2s 10k UT1s and every week or so a 1
hour piece aiming to cover as much distance as I could.
During the race I just took liquids, either Hi-5 and Hydroplus (2 hours in I
could tell I needed it, as that was the only time I could stand the taste of
the stuff) or SSI's "Go" - something that contains electrolytes is
essential, as life gets extremely uncomfortable and slow when you run out.
I'd go non-stop to Bardney, swig about 0.7 - 1L at the portage, then have
about 2 stops thereafter.
