'The half went well, but it's all about the marathon'

Last Saturday's half-marathon was a good indicator that with the main event looming on the horizon, I’m feeling in good shape to have a real cut off three hours.

In last year’s half I ran one hour 27 minutes, and shaved two minutes off that in Mullingar earlier this year.

I’m a kilometre man, so the aim for the Dublin marathon is to run 4:16 per km (6.52 per mile). For those wondering how that works out for a parkrun, it would be a 21:20 5km. But eight and a half back-to-back!

Earlier this summer I ran 3:55/km in a 10 mile race and felt comfortable. The question I had ahead of Saturday was, could I push that for another 5km? I felt I could.

The evening before I had a chat with my coach Emmett Dunleavy and the plan was to aim for four-minute kilometres. I've never run 21km at four-minute per km (6.26/mile) before so there is always that element of doubt, it's the unknown, but you just have to trust your training.

The way the half course is in the Phoenix Park, the first 3km is downhill, so you can almost bank a bit of time there. It was an opportunity to get a few seconds in and see how I felt.

What you have to contend with a large race like that is the atmosphere of it, the buzz of the event itself.

You feel fresh waiting at the start and the temptation to charge off is hard to resist. You do that and chances are you'll overcook the first mile; by mile three you could be putting yourself in the red.

I find going off a conservative pace works well for me. It eases me into the race and I find I have greater control. That’s something I have learned from previous mistakes and the more races I enter.

At about seven miles, I felt springy and could have pushed on, but I had to remind myself, it wasn’t about Saturday. It’s about breaking