Day 38: An Early Start and a Tricky Threshold Run

Well, here we are at Day 38 of the London Marathon 2025 training plan. This morning featured a 5 am rise—not strictly necessary for a 40-minute run, but a useful exercise in conditioning my body for the early starts ahead. There’s something oddly reassuring about being awake before even the most enthusiastic morning birds have started their complaints about the cold. Training is, after all, about balance: work, life and the perpetual quest for more sleep.

Slippery Slopes and Careful Steps

The temperature has taken another nosedive and the ground was less than cooperative. Any downhill sections required the kind of careful foot placement usually reserved for tightrope walkers or people trying to quietly sneak past a sleeping cat. With icy patches keeping me on my toes—sometimes quite literally—I had to take it easy where I’d usually enjoy a carefree descent.

Today's session was a threshold run, featuring one 17-minute effort at around 165 bpm. Not the easiest target to hit when every step felt like negotiating a truce with gravity. Uphill sections, however, were surprisingly helpful, as they naturally pushed my heart rate up without needing to increase speed dramatically. Threshold runs are supposed to be difficult, a fact I remind myself of regularly while trying not to question my life choices mid-run. Improvement often disguises itself as exhaustion, and today was no exception.

Winning the Daily Balance

Despite the early start, I managed to get to work in good time and take a reasonably laid-back approach to the morning routine. Balance is key—not just in training but in ensuring that running doesn’t spill over into the parts of life that involve sitting down and drinking coffee. Today, at least, felt like a small victory in that regard.

Preparing for the Real Test

Tomorrow poses an even greater challenge: an early morning 1 hour 17 minute run, which will be my longest pre-work effort yet. Typically, my weekday runs max out at an hour, so this will be a test of both endurance and my ability to plan a route that doesn’t involve unnecessary laps. I’ve never been one for running past a finish line without stopping—there’s something deeply unnatural about it, like taking a bite of chocolate and not eating the rest of the bar.

The London Marathon is creeping ever closer—Sunday, April 27. Every run now is another step toward being as prepared as possible. Sticking to the plan isn’t always easy, but if marathons were simple, they wouldn’t be quite so satisfying to finish.