Tapering 101: Don’t Make Major Changes Your Diet

The title is the golden rule, unfortunately I didn’t listen to it. I’ve been pigging out the entire weekend, lots of cake, a few beers, more cake, chocolate, too much meat etc. The trouble is that my body is not used to all these calories, I’m not running so much and as a result I feel sluggish. I’ve also gained a pound or two, which in itself is almost expected, the trouble is that it was too much sugar and fat calories.

I went for a 14K/8.7M run this afternoon and felt like I was carrying a bowling ball in my stomach. I also felt sluggish during the whole run, no zip! I still managed a 5:34/K (8:57/M) pace, which kind of surprised me, I felt like I needed about 15 minutes per mile.

In any case I need to really watch my diet during this last week before my marathon. I was doing really well eating pasta and salad at least once a day, with meat just once every day or two and almost no sweets.

I was watching the Cologne (Germany) Marathon today before I ran. First and second place winner for the men were from Kenya, no big surprise. The winner finished in 2:11:xx and was fit for an interview with a couple minutes. Amazing! The first female runner was a German who finished in 2:34:xx I believe. Blazing fast gal, third time she won the marathon in Cologne!

It was interesting to watch the 'normal' people finishing, those that need more than 4 hours. It is somehow comforting to see that I’m not the only one who looks like they need oxygen when they finish. You can almost tell the ones that finish their first marathon, the faces are all aglow, some break down in tears, all are overcome with emotions. Wow!

Well next Sunday is my big day. Anybody else racing next weekend?