Are Spring Marathons too Risky?

Gringo78

Sick last week for about the 3rd or 4th time since christmas....vomiting bug which had me laid low for 2 days and stopped me running for 3 days. Wasn't a big issue, training had been going well since january and I had 3 good hard weeks beforehand so the small step back for the week was no harm. But it got me thinking....if I had been targetting a spring marathon, London would have been it and I would have not been 100% for it and would been devastated.

I had one 'A' race this spring and had some sort of a virus on the day so was totally out of sorts, ran about 4min off my target time for a 10 miler when I had been very confident of breaking 60min. I wasn't that p*ssed off as there's plenty of opportunity to run 10 milers but if it had been a marathon, well that would have been a disaster.

When I look at my training log, this happens every year from jan - april, loads of bugs around, flu's, winter vomiting bug, the kid is a little germ sponge from the creche, it just seems like a hell of a gamble targetting a marathon at this time of the year.

Am I being paranoid or am I just as much at risk during the summer? It would seem to me August would be the best time for a marathon. September is when the schools reopen and they put a heap of kids together in a room and the germs have a field day again.

RayCun

I think the weather is a bigger issue. In the summer you have more routes available and more hours of daylight to run in, and in Ireland it will never get really hot.
Winter you have snow and ice, parks closed, need a headtorch if you're away from the road - can make it harder to get the quality runs in.

BrokenMan

I would be nervous about putting a spring marathon in as a A goal certainly.

If you wanted to put one in the legs and bank the training for later in the year I think its certainly worthwhile, and what I did this year by running Connemara.

Magnet

Coming up to my "A" race in January this year, my worst fear outside of the usual injuries was getting any sniffle/flu/virus. So I upped my intake of vitamin C and D (shed loads of D) and I got through it without any sniffles. I had 4 days off at Xmas which I ran 27, 20, 8 and 26.2 miles while my nonrunning OH, his mother and brother all got swineflu.

Stark

I've aimed for a Spring marathon two years running now and both years have been thwarted by snow, ice, viruses etc. (well, the ice and viruses anyway, the snow was awesome). Did a June marathon and an October marathon and things went much smoother for those.

RayCun

Was thinking more about the weather on my run home, for obvious reasons.
Do a spring marathon, and the weather on the day will tend to be hotter than during your training. Run an autumn marathon, and you've probably trained in some heat, but it will be cooler on the day.

baza1976

Tell me about it.

I have been training hard all through the ice, rain dark mornings and dark nights. Since the kids got the vomiting bug over 2 months ago I have been getting sore throats, coughs, stuffy nose/head and endless phlem. Day before the connemarathon I had to take 3 sppons of cough bottle and 2 pain killers. I blew up(super nova exploded) at about 18/19 miles. jUst zap no energy, gone, empty. I had been taken gels and took water from every station.

I had planned on doing Limerick and Cork marathons but because of the condition of me before and even more so the day after the connemarathon I decided to do no running till I get these bugs or what ever is causing me to be sick for last few months sorted. Got bloods taken yesterday, so I should know something tomorrow.

Similar experinence the morning of Last years limerick marathon.

Sick of been sick

petermijackson

Gotta agree with the thoughts on training in the cold and then racing in the heat. It was not too ago that I was out running with gloves and hat and then the heat in London on Sunday was unreal.

RacoonQueen

All sounds very familiar...last year training for Barcelona I picked up a virus in mid-February that floored me for the next 6 or 7 months. Was only getting over it when I got swine flu at the end of December, which knocked me again. Had been taken all the supplements in the world to stop myself getting sick again after that and still picked up a nasty chest infection/pnuemonia in mid-march.

See Frank, I'm not the ONLY one. :P

ultraman1

RacoonQueen wrote: »

I'm not the ONLY one. :P

maybe u gave it to the rest of them:D

Mr Slow

Slightly off topic but should one train through a dose of man flu?

rainbow kirby

Against: The 2 colds in 3 weeks I had before Barcelona, the second one only cleared the day before the race (which I am now convinced were two manifestations of the same lousy sinus infection)

For: No hayfever during training

MrCreosote

mrslow wrote: »

Slightly off topic but should one train through a dose of man flu?

Never train through man flu. The best thing to do would be to lie in bed and moan, request chicken soup, order DVDs to be put on etc. Save your energy for that

Mr Slow

MrCreosote wrote: »

Never train through man flu. The best thing to do would be to lie in bed and moan, request chicken soup, order DVDs to be put on etc. Save your energy for that

2 kids under 6 = no rest

If I can't rest I'm inclined to run:)

Mike D

Having trained throughout the Winter for London, I managed to avoid colds and flu, got out in the worst of weather. Then get to London and there's a flippin heatwave in Spring! It was very hot especially with the amount of runner and the crowds!

It could just as easily have been raining or cold. I would rather take my chances running an October/Autumn marathon as the heat did me in last weekend.

ger664

Had the same last year for Belfast (not really spring) but several head colds and chest infections during training which reduced the quality of my training

Solved it this year, attended a nutritional workshop in November and was told that distance runners suffer from reduced Gluatamine Levels which in turn brings down your imune system. I started taking a recovery drink with gluatamine in it this winter and did not get one sniffle/bug.

opus

I was tempted by Barcelona this year cause so many people from ART were doing it but having to train over xmas put me off. Picked Leipzig instead as mid-April looked like a better bet for training starting the 12 weeks on Jan 18th.

Was pretty lucky as didn't get anything worse than a few sniffles during the 12 weeks, only extra thing I did was to take a high-strength vitamin C tablet everyday to ward off colds but of course that might just be a placebo!

theboyblunder

Would agree with most of the above - however I got what turned out to be whooping cough right before longford last year. Bad luck can happen at any time. Its the nature of the marathon really. People booze a lot in the winter too (nothing else to do ).......

shotgunmcos

If you generally fall ill at a certain time of year all you can do is adapt yourself to best protect yourself.

Personally I know that the change of seasons to Spring, approx end March to end April kind of time is a tightrope walk for my immune system. I just take Pharmaton, avoid sick kids (where possible), wash my hands religiously, drink more water, cover my lips when the sun comes out etc...

There is no guarantee but you can just take extra precautions at a time of year that seems to affect you most.

I actually miss the -10 bacteria free air some of us ran outside in during the winter sometimes. If only we could have that and the sun together :rolleyes: