This weekend members of Defy Functional Fitness helped raise $1020 for Holland Bloorview Kids Hospital.
We had seven runners at the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon. A huge thanks to everyone who donated and helped us to our target.
I’ve recently switched my focus from competitive CrossFit over to endurance events – you can read my Half Ironman experience here.
One of my main motivations is to prove that you can do relatively well in these events without spending hours running every week and you can be fit & strong in other areas.
A quick google search brought up this 12-week training plan for running a marathon:
The total mileage from week 1-11 is around 305 miles or 490km. There are 5 days of running per week and very little (if any) strength training. The article did say that Friday’s is a Cross-training day but recommended skipping it most weeks.
I just pulled up my Strava stats to see exactly what my prep was in terms of running. Since 2017 (when I started on Strava), I have run 96 times for a total of 805.5km (average 8.3km/run). This year I have run 37 times for a total of 396.9km (average 10.7km/run) which includes this weekend’s marathon and the half marathon from the Ironman 70.3.
So my total running this year, including two big races, has been less than the first 11 weeks of the above training plan.
The race itself was pretty good. JP, Patrick and I lined up at the start behind the 3hr 45min pace bunny. I was hoping to be under 4 hours and close to 3:30 would’ve been awesome. I really had no idea what would happen after the 20km marker. I had done a couple of faster 14km runs over the previous two weeks but that was as far as I had gone. I knew there would be pain and I didn’t mind suffering – that’s actually another reason I was there!
We set off around 8:50am with perfect weather conditions. A little chilly to stand still in but great for running. As soon as we crossed the line, my competitive mindset kicked in. 3 hours 30 was my goal so I caught up and passed the 3:30 pace bunny. The pace felt good so I held it and carried on. Patrick ran off ahead and we lost him after about 2km. JP and I ran together for a while.
I was worried about my calves after doing the CrossFit Open workout 20.2 on Thursday, which had lots of double unders in it (skipping), but for the most part, they were ok. I was experimenting with different foot placements as my right knee didn’t feel great early on.
I wanted to make sure I didn’t cramp late on in the race so every 30mins I planned to have a gel consisting of maple syrup, ginger and salt. Just after I had the first gel I ran up ahead to find a garbage can and lost JP. I didn’t want to break my stride so I carried on, things felt good!
As I was running down Lakeshore by the BMO Field, the pros were coming up the other way. I shouted to a guy next to me asking if they were running the same race (I knew they were), but their pace was insane, it looked like they were doing a 400m sprint.
The turn around point seemed to take forever and was almost at the Humber River, 12.5km into the race. The route then went all the way down Lakeshore to Bayview. A good 12-13km, taking us passed the half marathon, my official time was 1hour 40mins 13seconds. The annoying thing was my watch said that I’d run 400m further. Annoying for a guy that likes data like me.
My first 10km was 47:15 and I did the math to try to be faster than that for the next two 10kms. So at 20km, I needed to be at 1hour 44mins 30s (which I was under on my watch) then at the 30km I wanted to be under 2hours 21min 45s. Doing this math in my head helped to pass a few km’s at a time as I re-checked my calculations over.
There was a little loop around Bayview before the course took us back to Lakeshore and upto the 30km mark – under my time. I had caught up to Patrick at about 24km, he looked in good spirits, we shared a fist bump and on I went. From 30-40km was a GRIND. I saw a lot of people cramping and pulling up at the side of the road. It also stunk from the sewage place down there. It was windy and I was bored of running.
At the end of Lakeshore, we went onto Queen Street and the music and people lining the road really helped to boost morale. I latched onto a runner at this point who was going about my pace. We didn’t speak but ran together all the way to the end. Every time we ran passed large crowds or speaker systems playing music, I felt like we both got an extra jolt of energy and were able to push the pace a bit harder.
At 39km we crossed over the Lower Don river on Eastern Ave. The small incline felt like a mountain at that point so I upped the pace to get it over quicker. It burned but it was worth it.
Running up Bay street was the final stretch to the finish line. I wanted to run hard but my left hamstring started to cramp very lightly so I stuck to my pace and ran it home.
3 hours 23 minutes and 47 seconds was my official finish time.
This result confirmed my theory for the second time that you can do CrossFit as your base fitness program. Add in some longer aerobic pieces like riding a bike or going for a run. When you want to do a specific event, drop your strength training to 3 times per week and do a couple of event-specific training sessions.
Maybe it is possible for me to run a sub-3-hour marathon but I would have to sacrifice some of my strength training and my muscle mass. The extra running would also increase my chance of injury. For me at this time, it isn’t worth it.
Mix up your training as much as possible. Keep and good base of strength and then apply it to whatever sport you want. You will look better, feel better and have the right to call yourself a bad**s.