El Sorchio!

After Monday's day off, I was looking forward to The usual Tuesday tempo, and hoping to put another solid week of training in.
As I headed out on Tuesday morning, Sunday's long run was still very much in the legs. They were heavy from the off, and I suppose the entire weeks high distance was there.
One mile warmup as usual, 7:20. The plan was for 6 miles at 6:20. As has been happening a lot lately, I struggled at the off with the pace, and mile 1, although 6:14, felt like a 5k effort, and mile two at 6:18 was the same, so I stopped. I was very disappointed, and to be honest I was just going to quit the session and go home. I decided to try and salvage some slow miles, and ran 1 mile at 7:13, which felt quite easy. That losened me up a bit, including my mood, so I decided to do another two mile set, 6:15, 6:17. Two miles to home at 7:30, and I at least salvaged an 8 mile session, with four hard miles.

Wednesday morning I got up before work and did 8 easy miles, 7:17 average. It seems that just below the 7:20 mile pace is where I am sitting comfortably.

Thursday was speed session, ran in the evening on the track. Two miles warmup to get there at 7:06 avg. The session was to be 8x800, with 90 second recovery between, at faster than 1 mile pace.
I was a bit nervous at how I would fare out with the harder pace. The mile splits, which comprised of two 800's were 5:34, 5:36, 5:32, 5:37. I was very happy with the session, I felt I could have easily done another few sets, well one anyway. Two miles to home at 7:17 avg.

Friday was 7 miles, after a very early start and a very long day, and my motivation to go out was low, but I felt good after it, 7:14 average, and not really pushing.

Saturday was a very easy 10 miles, for a change I was not running solo. I joined a group of three other runners and enjoyed the company. We went early enough, 10am, but even as we finished, temperatures were at 24 degrees, something us Irish are just not built for!

Today's run was to be 16. I was apprehensive about this one for a umber of reasons. Firstly, the 10 miles the day before, and secondly, 16 is the longest run I have done this year. Another scorching day did not help. The run went well, I chose a fairly undulating, but not hilly, route, on a good surface. I carried my bottle of drink, a water and cordial mix, something I hate doing because I think it does affect your form, and ultimately increase the required effort. I definitely felt the effort over the last two miles, again the 22 degrees didn't help, but I finished well enough. Target pace was a 7:20, and in the end it was 7:16 for 16.04 miles.

So again, 56 miles for this week, and very happy with the consistency. Obviously the Tuesday workout sessions might be coming just a bit too early after the long run on Sunday, so I might have to adjust that sequence, maybe look at doing the long run on Saturday instead.