It's Taper Time!

With about three weeks before the Cebu City Marathon, every runner who is training for this running event should be starting in their tapering week. 

Last Saturday, when I was responding to Wayne Plymale's questions for his runner feature blog, a lady asked if I am joining the running clinic at the Active Zone in Ayala. She actually noticed that I was wearing my VFF KSO Trek. I gladly said yes to her. She then introduced herself as Marie Calica, the editor in chief of Runners' World Philippines. 

With Marie was Beth Siojo, a mult-awarded triathlete, a serial marathoner, and a columnist of Runners' World Philippines. Beth shared to us that the final three weeks are the most important weeks in any marathon program. 

Here are some tips that I learned from her discussion:

• stick with the same running schedule but  decrease total mileage from last week by at least 20 percent
• take in a lot of protein
• buy the shoes you plan to wear in the marathon, and wear them on most of your runs until race day
• on the day before the race, jog around 3K to take the edge off your pent-up energy so you'll sleep better that night
• do carbo-loading in the last 3 days before the race 
• be sure to prepare your race outfit, shoes, timing chip, number, bag and map to the start are set out the night before the race day
• eat light at least 2 hours before the race, such as oatmeal or a banana

I can't recall the others things anymore. But at least I get to learn some from the expert. :-)

On another note, we celebrated the birthday of fellow Ungo runner Adrian Catingub with a 33K run. That was our last LSD prior to taper week. We ran from Consolacion to Catmon and finished off with good food and beach time.

Birthday Run with Adz (guy beside the KM33 marker)

Well, it's Taper Time indeed. But goodluck to all this Christmas season. Lots of food and carbs await us but just remember to eat light and burn those calories.