Mentally I feel like I have turned a corner. My running is starting to improve and I think as the volume increases that physically I am adapting to the workload and recovering more quickly between sessions. Well those were my thoughts at the start of the week...
Sunday:
AM) short fartlek session
The plan was to run an easy 30min recovery session but I was feeling a little frisky. Ended up running a fartlek session using telegraph poles as markers for when to run hard and when to run easy. Felt good!
Monday:
AM) 1h easy w/ strides
PM) 1h easy
Just a couple of easy runs.
Tuesday:
AM) hill session
Today's hill session didn't go to plan at all. I was scheduled to run 15 repeats but after 5 I was completely done with it. Maybe it was the heat and humidity after the rains yesterday which brought me undone. On the climbs my lungs and legs felt heavy. Out of frustration on the way back to the car I started alternating 30 seconds hard with 30 seconds of easy running. Felt better.
Wednesday:
AM) 45min steady
PM) Mid long run
Felt ordinary and expected to have a very poor run. Goes to show how you feel prior to the run is no indication of how you'll perform. Started out struggling but of course that was before I knew we were moving along at quicker than 4min/km pace. Fast runners make it look easy. After a regroup I found a second wind and was able to finish the session with an average pace for the 27-28km just shy of marathon pace.
Thursday:
AM) 1h easy - with Simon for two laps of the river. Great morning for a run!
Friday:
noon) Easy run
Wilted during my run in the heat. Got about 10km into the run when I realised I was in trouble but when you've gone out, you need to come back. Drank from all the bubblers and taps I passed but it didn't seem to help the situation. Even drenching my face, neck, arms, legs and hat didn't help...
PM) Long Interval session
Regrouped a few hours later with the idea of getting in some quality. Started out conservatively but when I started on my first interval running faster felt reasonable and I was able to cover about 4kms on the first. After a 5min recovery jog I started on the second repeat and while it felt tough I was able to get through it covering another 4km. With a hard 5min left to go I tried pushing it a little and managed to average slightly quicker than 3:20/km pace to finish up the quality work. An easy run back to the car completed the day's training with over 30km in the books.
Saturday:
AM) Easy session
The day started off with thoughts of running long but as the heat quickly picked up I decided that the hour of running I had in my planned schedule would be enough. With my wife picking me up on route to my mother's place for her birthday lunch I went a little over the allotted time but I did manage to add a little excitement to the run when I had to jump over a 2m long brown snack as it crawled out of the creek and ended up in front of me on the footpath. It must have been quite a site as I side-stepped and jumped simultaneously.
Summary:-
Another 130+km of running for the week making it (I think) the third in a row. Looking at the schedule for next week it looks like it's going to be a reduced volume week with a 10k race on the weekend. While some runners look forward to their rest (lower volume) weeks I am already starting to fret over the lack of running and the rest that I know I need to take. I'll have to find another way to fight my demons and quieten the voices that compel me to lace up the shoes and hit the road.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Training 14-20 September
I'm hoping that last week signaled a return of form and I can continue to feel good while running and training! A month of feeling depleted has been hard on the motivation but I struggled through knowing that I would eventually start feeling better and thankfully that's what happened over the last few days.... excluding Sunday though.
This week was to start with a long run on Sunday morning but another restless night filled with children's coughing fits and nightmares when the alarm went off at 5:30am I hit stop rather than snooze. At 6am when the first of the children woke for the day I immediately knew my long run plans were cancelled. Not a happy start to my training for the week.
Although I didn't get out for my long run I did however manage to get in two runs for the day. The first was in the rain before lunch which included roughly 16 minutes threshold during a mindless 35 minute run around the streets. The second run was later in the evening with my wife and to say I was struggling would be an understatement.
Training summary
Sunday:
AM: 35 minute run w/ 4.2km threshold (av. 3:48 pace)
PM: 60 minute easy run
Plans for the remainder of the week...
Monday:
AM: 50 min easy w/ strides
PM: 60 min easy to moderate
On a hot day both runs were hard work but enjoyable. By the time I had finished running home I was ready to eat....and that's what I did. I consumed all the fruit and drink that I could stomach before making a start on cooking dinner for the screaming masses.
Tuesday:
AM: longer session with short hill reps
Got up at 4:45am this morning to meet Simon for an easy 10k before heading down to the start of where I run my short hill workouts. Session called for 30 repeats with a fast jog back down recovery. I started out conservatively and although I successfully completed the workout in hindsight I should have pushed myself a little harder. Perhaps knowing that I had a 10km run to after the session to get to work was on the back of my mind and kept me from going harder. I need to work HARDER!
Wednesday:
PM: 90min steady w/ strides
Forgot to do the strides but had an awesome run. I was at a local conference today which meant that I ate lots of cheese, fruits and nuts etc which left me feeling a little full and bloated. Afternoon tea (about 2 hours before I was planning on running) I consumed 2 small pieces of cake - for the energy during the run of course!
At the start of the run I assumed that I would be struggling early but I quickly settled into a good pace with little effort (sub 3hr marathon pace) and found as the run went on that I started feeling better and better with each passing kilometre. By the end of the run I had completed a half marathon in under 90 minutes, it felt relatively easy and I was feeling great. Good enough to keep going - you betcha! I find it always surprising when I have a great run (or workout) when I feel so ordinary in the hours leading up to it and the opposite happens when I am feeling good.
This week was to start with a long run on Sunday morning but another restless night filled with children's coughing fits and nightmares when the alarm went off at 5:30am I hit stop rather than snooze. At 6am when the first of the children woke for the day I immediately knew my long run plans were cancelled. Not a happy start to my training for the week.
Although I didn't get out for my long run I did however manage to get in two runs for the day. The first was in the rain before lunch which included roughly 16 minutes threshold during a mindless 35 minute run around the streets. The second run was later in the evening with my wife and to say I was struggling would be an understatement.
Training summary
Sunday:
AM: 35 minute run w/ 4.2km threshold (av. 3:48 pace)
PM: 60 minute easy run
Plans for the remainder of the week...
Monday:
AM: 50 min easy w/ strides
PM: 60 min easy to moderate
On a hot day both runs were hard work but enjoyable. By the time I had finished running home I was ready to eat....and that's what I did. I consumed all the fruit and drink that I could stomach before making a start on cooking dinner for the screaming masses.
Tuesday:
AM: longer session with short hill reps
Got up at 4:45am this morning to meet Simon for an easy 10k before heading down to the start of where I run my short hill workouts. Session called for 30 repeats with a fast jog back down recovery. I started out conservatively and although I successfully completed the workout in hindsight I should have pushed myself a little harder. Perhaps knowing that I had a 10km run to after the session to get to work was on the back of my mind and kept me from going harder. I need to work HARDER!
Wednesday:
PM: 90min steady w/ strides
Forgot to do the strides but had an awesome run. I was at a local conference today which meant that I ate lots of cheese, fruits and nuts etc which left me feeling a little full and bloated. Afternoon tea (about 2 hours before I was planning on running) I consumed 2 small pieces of cake - for the energy during the run of course!
At the start of the run I assumed that I would be struggling early but I quickly settled into a good pace with little effort (sub 3hr marathon pace) and found as the run went on that I started feeling better and better with each passing kilometre. By the end of the run I had completed a half marathon in under 90 minutes, it felt relatively easy and I was feeling great. Good enough to keep going - you betcha! I find it always surprising when I have a great run (or workout) when I feel so ordinary in the hours leading up to it and the opposite happens when I am feeling good.
Thursday:
AM: easy run
PM: interval session
Managed to get out for the interval session late in the day which only allowed for 50 minutes of run time. After a short warmup I got stuck into and ended up running 5 x 4min efforts with 90 second recovery. I was scheduled for six repeats but didn't have the time. Speed was supposed to be quicker than 5k race pace and I found it tough. This faster training makes all the marathon training that I have done in the past seem easy. Of course this is where I need to work in if I'm going to improve at the shorter distances.
Friday:
AM: recovery run
I can't quite remember this day but I do know that I did manage to get out for an easy run of sorts.
Saturday:
PM: easy w/ a little threshold
I had no real plans when I headed out the door so just went out and ran. After about 4km I tried pushing the pace and ended up running 3km at slightly quicker than threshold. I felt immediately great when I started working the pace and my form feels like it has improved over the last few weeks.
Summary:
Another good week in the books but still lacking a good long run effort. I will need to address this soon!
Weekly mileage was up around 130km again for the second week running. Coach has told me that I need to build on this. I will try next week...
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Training 7-13 September
This week has felt much more like the training of old and it has been a killer.
Sunday:
AM: Long run around the streets of the lower
Monday:
AM: Run easy for a couple of loops of the
PM: Run home via all the hills I could find.
The run home was solid. I felt strong on the hills and it was nice passing a few fitness people out there tackling the climbs.
Tuesday:
AM: Run easy to work
PM: (planned) 7x500m hill of 8-10% gradient.
PM: (actual) 7x300m hill at 13-15+% gradient.
I miss calculated the length and steepness of the street before heading out. It came as a surprise during my first rep. Toughed it out and felt great during the cooldown. Running on the flats felt like I was bounding along effortlessly.
Wednesday:
PM: Run 90 minute moderate.
Met up with a couple of fast dudes after work and preceded to get smacked. Although I was mostly at the front pushing the pace. Maybe not the smartest thing to do. We covered almost a half marathon in about 87 minutes of running.
Thursday:
AM: Run - Interval session.
I found a nice cricket ground about a mile from work and the surface was great to run on. If I can’t make one of the athletic ovals close to home then I will run my interval sessions here from now on. The session went OK but I didn’t have the time to relax into it. Took it out too fast and with little recovery (1 minute) they quickly got hard. I still had enough in the tank to let the last interval rip which was good to see.
PM: Run home – ran straight up Mitchell’s Pass which is the shortest route I could think of. But the climb was relentless.
Friday:
AM: (planned) – Long run
AM: (actual) – Recovery run to work.
After a much needed extra hours of sleep I decided to capitalize on the great running week behind me and take it easy and short this morning. The car was left at work so all I had to do was to roll the 10km downhill and keep it easy. The legs feel great!
Saturday:
AM: Workout.
Today's session called for some hard running followed by 10x100m hill repeats. I started out running easy but immediately I felt rather ordinary. I find it frustrating that I can feel so crappy after running easy but that I can feel so good after running moderate to hard the day before. Maybe I should stop running the easy recovery runs and just take a day off if needed.
After 15 minutes of easy running down to the nearest oval I found that it was closed for maintenance work. Damn! The only thing I could do now was to run hard tempo on the road and with hills in every direction it was going to much harder than planned.....and it was! After the hard running was over I headed back to the start of my hill which I use for the short hill reps and started running with the aim of completing 10. I felt like I was jogging on the first and was suprised that I was quicker than when I ran them last time (and I was fresh then). The first nine reps were in the 26-28 second range and with a little more effort I finished up with the last one in 23 seconds. Finished up with an easy 15 min run back home.
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