Tapering is good for you - honest!!

With less than two weeks to go until the London Marathon, I can assure you that I am well and truly tapering. It's unfortunate that the taper clashes with an exponential rise in the amount of chocolate in the house but it's welcome in many other ways.

I'm tired. So tired. I have run hundreds of miles, and I'm ready to take it a little easier. I'm loving the shorter distances, the lack of speedwork, the general recuperative aspect of it all. It's not that I don't love running - I wouldn't run 5 times a week over a variety of terrains and distances if I didn't. But my body is telling me it needs a break. So I'm embracing the taper period and enjoying it as a key part of training. I tell myself that every shorter run I do, a little bit of muscle repairs itself.  Admittedly, the extra time on my hands is a bit strange, but I've managed to catch up on a lot of movies, finish a really good book and spring clean the top floor of my house (there were a lot of unwanted, oversized, race t-shirts to throw out, people).

But as I look on Twitter, and on the many blogs I read, I note that others aren't quite as 'pro-tapering' as I am. I see people adding extra miles onto shorter runs, because they are feeling good. I see people still squeezing long runs in to compensate for earlier gaps in training. Running is so addictive, we can't leave it alone, even when our training plans tell us to!

Fellow London marathoners - put your feet up! Embrace the taper. Replenish your energy stores. Repair your muscles. Use the time to investigate new and exciting ways to carb up without eating pasta for every meal. Or, like me, use it to throw out those old oversized race t-shirts you never wanted and you're just keeping 'just in case'. Sign up for some late spring races. But whatever you do, leave those extra miles alone. You won't regret it on April 22.