Thankfully the sore quads disappeared, the two consecutive rest days did the trick.
Tuesday I did a mini speed session. Two miles warmup, and then 4x1 mile on the track. 5:50, 5:56, 5:55, 5:58. All under 6 minute miles, but didn't feel as comfortable as they would have a few weeks ago. Two miles home for 8.
Wednesday, 8 miles easy, which turned out to be 7:10, and not pushing hard so happy with that.
Thursday tempo run. One mile warmup at 7:20, then into a 10 mile tempo session. As recently, I set the watch to 6:35 pace. The first few miles were honest enough, all at 6:32, 6:31 pace. And thankfully that continued. As I approached what I thought was 8 miles, I was getting pretty tired, but was reasonably pleased, and confident of finishing the last two miles strongly. The watch beeped, and turns out I had only 7 miles done at tempo pace. I did utter a few expletives! The last mile was pushing it, 10k effort, but I finished in 64:45 for the 10 miles, and another easy mile home for 12.
8 easy on Friday, which were actually easy, 7:30 pace average, but while I kept the pace easy, there was no soreness or obvious fatigue at the previous day's efforts.
Saturday was intended to be an easy 6 miles, but circumstances meant no run.
Sunday was a nice morning, and out I went for a planned 18 miles.
Plan was 10 @ 7:15, 4 @ 7:10, and last 4 @ 7:05.
It didn't really work out that way though. The wind was on my back on the out segment of the first 9 miles, and I just ran to a semi easy feel, which saw the first 9 miles at 7:06 average.
When I turned into wind, I realised why they had felt so easy. However, I had to adjust the plane, as there was no point in running the same pace all the way. So I kept the next 5 miles at the same pace, but because I was into a headwind, the effort has harder. The last 4 I decided to pick things up a bit to test myself. Mile 15, 7:01, 16, 6:51, 17, 6:53, 18, 6:58.
Finished well, and happy with the pace only a few days after the 10 mile tempo.
As always, Monday was a rest day, but looking back, I should have done an 8 mile easy run. My legs actually showed little sign of the previous day's run, and as it turns out, I didn't get out Tuesday, so that was two days with no run. The plus side of that, is that I believe I was a lot stronger in the legs after two days break last week, so maybe that will stand to me this week also.
I do however, feel exceedingly overweight today having not run for two whole days!
Tuesday 15 August 2017
Monday 7 August 2017
Two Halfs don't make a Whole
Continuing in the disjointed training pattern this week.
Long run Monday. 20 miles at 7:07. Avg.
Tuesday, rest day.
Wednesday, 10 miles. I had some serious soreness in my quads after Monday's long run. While I was delighted with the run, and how it had gone, I did push the pace faster than I had intended, and now I was paying the price. The 10 miles were easy, at 7:25 average
Thursday, again, I was still quite sore, so 8 miles, again at an easy pace, trying to give the legs a chance to heal, but they were still very sore.
Friday, although I was still sore, I knew I needed some kind of a quality session for the week.
Plan was 1 warmup, then 13 at 6:35. It was ambitious , and the first easy mile I was still feeling quite sore in my quads, but I decided to give it a go. I often find that the fast twitch muscles required for the harder pace runs will feel entirely different than the feel of a pace maybe a minute slower.
And so it proved to be the case. While the harder pace felt easier, the soreness was still evident, albeit a lot less. I dropped into a nice 6:30 pace after the first two were a bit fast at 6:23, 6:26.
Up to 8 miles I was going really well. At that point, the pain in the quads was getting more pronounced again, and the legs began to protest loudly. At 10 miles at the 6:30 pace I gave up. The last two miles were 8:05 to home in a babystep shuffle, and quite a lot of discomfort, to finish a 13 mile session.
Saturday, surprisingly, there was actually little sign of the previous day's effort, in that while the legs were still sore, they were no more so than they had been setting off yesterday.
My intention was for 8-10 easy miles. I set out to just run to feel, with the hope of a 7:20 - 7:30 pace, and I was able to achieve that quite easily. Again, I was sore, but running. As I approached 10 miles, I decided to extend it a bit, testing my stamina after the previous day's tempo.
All went well to 13 miles, then I started to get into difficulty. The legs, again, very tired, and my energy was sapped. I pushed on home with 15 miles at 7:21 average.
The difficulty with this is, that I am afraid I am telling my body that I am fine to half way, but then it can quit. I have been here before with half marathon training, thinking two consecutive 10k's will produce a good half. They don't, you just fade at about 11 miles.
I knew I needed to give my quads time to heal, so I binned Sunday and Monday's run.minhavent had two days off for a while. I have a lot of time pressures this week with family life and work, it will likely be shorter, harder sessions until the weekend.
Hopefully the quads will have recovered when I head out tomorrow, otherwise, it's damage limitation.
Long run Monday. 20 miles at 7:07. Avg.
Tuesday, rest day.
Wednesday, 10 miles. I had some serious soreness in my quads after Monday's long run. While I was delighted with the run, and how it had gone, I did push the pace faster than I had intended, and now I was paying the price. The 10 miles were easy, at 7:25 average
Thursday, again, I was still quite sore, so 8 miles, again at an easy pace, trying to give the legs a chance to heal, but they were still very sore.
Friday, although I was still sore, I knew I needed some kind of a quality session for the week.
Plan was 1 warmup, then 13 at 6:35. It was ambitious , and the first easy mile I was still feeling quite sore in my quads, but I decided to give it a go. I often find that the fast twitch muscles required for the harder pace runs will feel entirely different than the feel of a pace maybe a minute slower.
And so it proved to be the case. While the harder pace felt easier, the soreness was still evident, albeit a lot less. I dropped into a nice 6:30 pace after the first two were a bit fast at 6:23, 6:26.
Up to 8 miles I was going really well. At that point, the pain in the quads was getting more pronounced again, and the legs began to protest loudly. At 10 miles at the 6:30 pace I gave up. The last two miles were 8:05 to home in a babystep shuffle, and quite a lot of discomfort, to finish a 13 mile session.
Saturday, surprisingly, there was actually little sign of the previous day's effort, in that while the legs were still sore, they were no more so than they had been setting off yesterday.
My intention was for 8-10 easy miles. I set out to just run to feel, with the hope of a 7:20 - 7:30 pace, and I was able to achieve that quite easily. Again, I was sore, but running. As I approached 10 miles, I decided to extend it a bit, testing my stamina after the previous day's tempo.
All went well to 13 miles, then I started to get into difficulty. The legs, again, very tired, and my energy was sapped. I pushed on home with 15 miles at 7:21 average.
The difficulty with this is, that I am afraid I am telling my body that I am fine to half way, but then it can quit. I have been here before with half marathon training, thinking two consecutive 10k's will produce a good half. They don't, you just fade at about 11 miles.
I knew I needed to give my quads time to heal, so I binned Sunday and Monday's run.minhavent had two days off for a while. I have a lot of time pressures this week with family life and work, it will likely be shorter, harder sessions until the weekend.
Hopefully the quads will have recovered when I head out tomorrow, otherwise, it's damage limitation.
Tuesday 1 August 2017
Out of Sync
The week started of well enough.
Tuesday was a 10 mile session. 1 mile warmup, then into 9 at a snappy pace. Not quite tempo, but all around he 6:40 mark.
Wednesday was 8 miles easy.
Thursday again, no speed session, but another tempo session of sorts but only 8 miles, a bit faster this time at 6:35 average.
Friday I ran at work. This was unusual for me, as I was doing my office day from our HQ building, which is fully equipped with some really swanky shower facilities.
I started off at an easy enough 7:30 pace, but found myself settling in at around 7:05. I pushed the last two under 7:00, and did exactly 10 miles, with a 7:13 average.
Saturday was 8 miles again, fairly easy, in between the heavy rain showers.
That gave me 44 miles for the 5 days. I was 'on call' on Sunday, which required me to be available to take phone calls at short notice throughout the day to trouble shoot any company problems which might arise. This meant a long run was not feasible, so I decided to defer it until Monday, and just took a rest day.
It was a long time where I had gone for a long run without having done a run the day before, and the legs felt really fresh heading out. The plan was for 20 miles, and the pace should have been 7:20, with the last 10 at 7:15. I have been considering the pace calculator prediction times, based on recent run times. They consistently put me well under 3 hours for a marathon distance, although I have learned to be sceptical of such predictions.
However, if I was to train towards a sub 3 or better, I decided to test the waters a bit with regards to pace. I set out at 7:10 pace, and to see how it would develope.
The first 10 were very comfortable, as they might be, on a long run, the first 10 are just travelling and that's where the real work starts. I was using just water and some gels for the later stage.
By 13, the pace was still flowing really well, and I felt I could go much faster, conciously holding back. At 15 miles, a natural flow produced a 6:51 mile. However, that's where I suffered a bit of a set back.
I had placed my water bottle by a gate, and as I was running a four mile loop, I would get some on each lap. At mile 16, the water was gone. So from just after 12 miles, I had no drink.
Whether it was real, or perceived, I began to really fixate on being very thirsty.
There was no big drop in performance however, although I was gasping. It started to rain and I was thankful for it for a change!
Finishing back at the house on 19:78 miles, I was so thirsty I couldn't be bothered rounding off the mile, and I drank water and a sports drink by the plenty when I got n the door. This brought me around quite quickly, and I was sure if I had some fluids along the way as planned, it would have felt easy over the last few miles. In the end, it was 7:07 average for the distance, and I was pleased with that. Even in training for Dublin last year, I would never have hit that pace over that distance. It actually felt easier to run faster. I think it might have something to do with stride length , and how long the foot is in contact with the road.
I was toying with an easy 8 miles today, but my quads were a bit sore, so I thought a rest and recovery day after the hard workout would be more appropriate , and so I did a light strength session instead. This does kind of put me out of sync though when considering weekly mileage, and I would consider tomorrow my start day, and Sunday my finish day, so not too sure whether to count the miles as for last week which would give me 64, or into this week.
It's not really important I suppose, the session is what's important, and how I recovery and progress from it.
Tuesday was a 10 mile session. 1 mile warmup, then into 9 at a snappy pace. Not quite tempo, but all around he 6:40 mark.
Wednesday was 8 miles easy.
Thursday again, no speed session, but another tempo session of sorts but only 8 miles, a bit faster this time at 6:35 average.
Friday I ran at work. This was unusual for me, as I was doing my office day from our HQ building, which is fully equipped with some really swanky shower facilities.
I started off at an easy enough 7:30 pace, but found myself settling in at around 7:05. I pushed the last two under 7:00, and did exactly 10 miles, with a 7:13 average.
Saturday was 8 miles again, fairly easy, in between the heavy rain showers.
That gave me 44 miles for the 5 days. I was 'on call' on Sunday, which required me to be available to take phone calls at short notice throughout the day to trouble shoot any company problems which might arise. This meant a long run was not feasible, so I decided to defer it until Monday, and just took a rest day.
It was a long time where I had gone for a long run without having done a run the day before, and the legs felt really fresh heading out. The plan was for 20 miles, and the pace should have been 7:20, with the last 10 at 7:15. I have been considering the pace calculator prediction times, based on recent run times. They consistently put me well under 3 hours for a marathon distance, although I have learned to be sceptical of such predictions.
However, if I was to train towards a sub 3 or better, I decided to test the waters a bit with regards to pace. I set out at 7:10 pace, and to see how it would develope.
The first 10 were very comfortable, as they might be, on a long run, the first 10 are just travelling and that's where the real work starts. I was using just water and some gels for the later stage.
By 13, the pace was still flowing really well, and I felt I could go much faster, conciously holding back. At 15 miles, a natural flow produced a 6:51 mile. However, that's where I suffered a bit of a set back.
I had placed my water bottle by a gate, and as I was running a four mile loop, I would get some on each lap. At mile 16, the water was gone. So from just after 12 miles, I had no drink.
Whether it was real, or perceived, I began to really fixate on being very thirsty.
There was no big drop in performance however, although I was gasping. It started to rain and I was thankful for it for a change!
Finishing back at the house on 19:78 miles, I was so thirsty I couldn't be bothered rounding off the mile, and I drank water and a sports drink by the plenty when I got n the door. This brought me around quite quickly, and I was sure if I had some fluids along the way as planned, it would have felt easy over the last few miles. In the end, it was 7:07 average for the distance, and I was pleased with that. Even in training for Dublin last year, I would never have hit that pace over that distance. It actually felt easier to run faster. I think it might have something to do with stride length , and how long the foot is in contact with the road.
I was toying with an easy 8 miles today, but my quads were a bit sore, so I thought a rest and recovery day after the hard workout would be more appropriate , and so I did a light strength session instead. This does kind of put me out of sync though when considering weekly mileage, and I would consider tomorrow my start day, and Sunday my finish day, so not too sure whether to count the miles as for last week which would give me 64, or into this week.
It's not really important I suppose, the session is what's important, and how I recovery and progress from it.
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