After the good run on Tuesday, which was on relatively fresh legs, I was looking forward to a solid weeks training ahead, trying to make up for the lack of mileage in the previous week.
Unfortunately, an early start and an overnight out of the country meant no run Wednesday.
Thursday saw me back on n the Irish soil, and after another long day, I eventually got out for a run that evening. The weather was good, and I headed to the track for some harder running.
The usual two mile warmup, and then in to a planned 4x1 mile repeats session.
I wanted to test my 5k pace somewhat, and I also wanted to try and get out of my 1 mile comfort zone pace of 5:50, so I make a concious effort to push the pace on the repeats.
5:41, 5:42, 5:42. Fairly consistent, with the virtual partner on the watch set to 5:45, so all just slightly faster than target. However, the effort was telling, and I knew I needed to save something for the runs ahead in the week, so I split the last mile into 2x800, same pace, which ended up as a 5:36 for the combined mile distance. Two miles to home, and again, happy with the run.
Friday was a bright, but fresher day, and as I had only done two sessions for the week, I decided to do my long run Friday evening, another factor in this decision being that the weather forecast for Saturday was for heavy rain early on.
As I stood outside swinging my legs to get the blood flowing, as I do, they felt quite sore, particularly the quads, the effort of the previous evening very evident. I was not unduly concerned, it usually disappears after 4 or 5 miles. I set out at marathon training pace, 7:20 with 15 miles the target.
In the early miles, the soreness did not dissipate, and the internal soreness I have often experienced after a very hard session was there, but although Thursday's session was hard, I didn't consider it 'very' hard. I pushed on, the pace being really hard work,moping that I would soon find my rhythm. It was an out an back run, so every mile out, added one to the way home. Just after 6 miles, when I hit a particularly long drag uphill, I knew I was in trouble. I turned at that point, consoling myself somewhat that at least I would get 12 in. The next few miles got progressively harder to maintain the pace, and at 10 miles, as the watch beeped, I let it go and slowed to whatever pace I could manage.
That turned out to be just under 8 minute mile pace, but felt a lot slower, and the effort was like a tempo. I would have taken a lift home if I could have gotten one!
I felt physically sick after the run for about an hour, and I can't remember feeling like that after a run in a long time.
Saturday was definitely going to be a rest day, and I made my way to Slane to watch guns and roses play. I enjoyed the gig immensely, almost as good as the first one, although I didn't have to queue for 30 minutes to get a beer at the first one!
Second bad decision. As we had left it late to plan out escape from Slane, we ingeniously decided we would cycle home if all else failed. We stashed the bikes earlier in the day in a nearby field, and after the concert, we went and collected them. We got a lot of cheers from many bemused onlookers as we donned our hi-viz and headlights, and mounted our mountain bikes. The fact that we had enjoyed the services of the beer tent for the evening was irrelevant. Brian is a very accomplished cyclist, me not so. But it was only 15 miles home, sure we would be grand, in our best Irish optimism.
It took just over an hour to get home, and we actually made it back almost an hour before the local bus did (I know this as it emptied its passengers almost directly outside my front door at 2 am).
Sunday evening, I headed out for 8 easy miles, hoping to at least make 40 for the week, but very quickly I realised it was not to be. Whether it was still the Thursday/Friday runs, or the 15 mile cycle, my legs were like blocks of lead, and only struggled to push out 6 easy miles so as not to totally write off the day.
This evening, as I had a rare day off on a Monday, I again ventured out in the evening.
Two easy to start. Our club 5k is tomorrow, so I didn't want to do many miles, or anything particularly taxing, but I did want to asses the state of the legs, so I pushed out 1 hard mile on the track as a little tester. I set the watch for 6:00 pace, and was happy to see 5:53 at a reasonable effort pace, with a bit left. The only worry was that the breathing was quite laboured. I only did 5 miles in total, I am hoping that the legs will have recovered sufficiently to put in a descent effort tomorrow night.
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