It's Belfast Marathon Eve! Here's my top tips for warming up & cooling down...
Happy Marathon Eve!
Good luck Belfast Runners – you’ve got this!
Happy Marathon Eve Belfast Runners!
We are within 24 hours of you tying up the laces & hitting the roads for the 2021 Belfast City Marathon. At this stage you’ve likely reached the peak of your training, so I’m here to talk to you about my top tips for your final prep – warming up & cooling down.
Warming up:
No matter the distance to be covered on the day the importance of an appropriate warm up that achieves the following 3 goals cannot be overstated:
Increase blood flow to joints & muscles
Slowly elevates the heart rate
Primes you mentally for the run.
That’s why it’s important you ditch the old school PE style static stretching (you know the stuff, kick your heel to your butt & hold), in favour of dynamic stretching that takes the joints through a wide range of movement achieving the three goals above. Grab a cold shower, yes cold! And try the following sequence at home before you leave for a training session or marathon day itself.
You may also benefit from simple heart rate raising drills like jumping jacks, lunges with rotation & butt kicks to keep you warm at the start line, or while waiting for a handover during the relay race.
Cooling Down:
You’ve finished your training run, or maybe even the marathon itself, and whilst the temptation might be to grab a boojum and a celebratory drink before anything else, I assure you will benefit at least equally from the following cool down sequence.
Actually scrap that, grab a boojum, a celebratory drink, plenty of water AND THEN try the following rest & recovery yoga flow.
The perfect accompaniment (especially to those longer runs) that will:
lower the heart rate
boost circulation to working muscles
Reduce stress & leave you feeling super chilled.
Good luck with the final stages of your training & fundraising team! You got this!
Superstar Runners Shout Out!
Couldn’t sign off without giving two long time Fitness Belfast supporters - and sisters in law - a big good luck shout out! Both busy people, running for awesome causes - we’ll be cheering them on!
Bootcamp Superstar Katie running in the Ophthalmology Relay Team for Friends of the Cancer Centre!
Leg 3 is the one, and then she’ll be racing to the finish line to cheer on her husband - who’s still in denial that he’s really signed up for the whole thing! If you’d like to donate to their team cause, Friends of the Cancer Centre, you can do that here!
Bootcamp Superstar Nicole running in the Mitchell House School Relay Team!
Kicking off on leg 1, Nicole is running to support and raise awareness of Mitchell House School! If you’d like to find out more, you can do that here!