Week 4 summary

Mon – 6 miles recovery (7:27m/m)
Tue – 6 miles easy (7:03m/m)
Wed – 8  miles inc 5 x 600m intervals (6:51m/m avg)
Thu –  14 miles medium long (6:52m/m)
Fri – AM 4 miles easy (7:11m/m) PM 6 miles easy (7:25m/m)
Sat – 18 miles long run (7:39 m/m)
Sun – 10 miles inc SEAA 12 Stage Road Relays (6:31m/m avg)

Total – 71 miles

A slight cut back in mileage this week, but with the SEAA men’s 12 stage road relays as a tune up race on the Sunday.

I hadn’t noticed it after my marathon pace session the previous Sunday, but this time it was the turn of my left hamstring to play up. It wasn’t actually pulled, but it felt weakened and as though it might go if pushed too hard. Hence, I took two easy days at the beginning of the week, letting it recover properly.

Wednesday felt better, so decided to do the planned light interval session. The 5 x 600m was over very quickly, and although my form was a bit ragged I did the 600m efforts in 1:56 (about 5:04m/m), faster than the 5k pace called for. As usual the session was bookended by a 2.66 mile warm up and down.

Thursday was a medium long run of 14 miles, which I took at a good steady pace of around 6:45m/m for the last 9 miles. I felt good during this run, but it must have tired me out a bit as I was feeling heavy in the legs the following day and during Saturdays long run, which largely a plod.

SEAA Mens 12 Stage Road Relays

Another big event in the national athletics club calendar, and it was a privilege to take part. With 36 complete teams entered there was a great atmosphere at the new venue of Stantonbury Stadium, with music and barbecues in the club tent village that sprung up on the in-field, and hundreds of keen athletes soaking up the warm spring sunshine.

The relays consist of alternating short (5.053km) and long (7.664km) legs, with the 12 legs starting and finishing on the track and looping round the traffic free “redways” of Milton Keynes. I was down for the 3rd leg, of the long variety, which I checked out on a warm up run.

I  wanted to put in a good effort, as my run at the relays last year counted as one of my best ever runs on the Power of 10 web site. Coming towards the end of spring marathon training, it’s a good chance to gauge fitness levels and see year on year progress.

I went out pretty fast (grandstanding to the crowds in the stadium) and almost tripped headlong on a barrier trying to round a tight corner. Once I got that behind me I settled down to a steadier but still fast pace. A young runner from local rivals Hillingdon sped past me after a few hundred metres, I was unable to go with him but chose not to panic and play the long game.

The runners were quite spread out already by this stage, and I didn’t hear anyone else behind me. I just focused on the rival ahead and slowly reeled him back in, finally catching him at around the 4k mark.

Although the course was generally flat there were a few inclines on each lap, and I knew one of these was coming up so decided to put a surge in to see if I could drop him. I powered up the hill and kept going at the top, not looking back once. Soon enough I couldn’t hear him any more, and just tried to hang onto the pace to get a good time.

Soon enough the track came into view and it was all over. My time of 26:44 was satisfying, and the second fastest time for a long leg on the day by our club. At the end of my leg we were in 20th position (good enough to qualify for the national relays in a few weeks), but unfortunately by the end of the day we’d faded back to 29th.

The relay is ranked as my highest age graded performance on Power of 10, with a score of 78.45%, up from 74.04% last year. Closely following this years relay is the Bath Half with 77.28%. All in all, this is a satisfying indication that the winters marathon training has paid off, and sets me up for a good race in 4 weeks 🙂

 

Week 5 summary

Mon – AM 6 miles recovery (8:12m/m) PM 4 miles recovery (7:52m/m)
Tue – 15 miles medium long (7:23m/m)
Wed – 9  miles inc 6 x 1000m intervals (6:42m/m avg)
Thu –  AM 6 miles easy (7:13m/m) PM 4 miles easy (7:24m/m)
Fri – 13 miles medium long (6:55m/m)
Sat – 6 miles recovery (8:16 m/m)
Sun – 20 miles inc 14 miles marathon pace 6:18m/m (6:37m/m avg)

Total – 84 miles

A pretty full on week with 2 doubles, 2 medium long runs, a track session and a 20 mile long run with 14 miles at marathon pace  to end the week. Phew!

My legs felt remarkably fresh after the Bath Half Marathon last Sunday, just mild soreness in the quads, though as the week went on it was evident I was actually more fatigued than first thought.

Mondays runs were taken at a very relaxed pace, I had the day booked off work and it was really nice just to trot round the fields and parks in the glorious Spring sunshine. I was still a bit tired on Tuesday so that nights 15 mile run was also taken somewhat more gently than normal.

Wednesday was spent at Perivale track with a satisfying interval session of 6 x 100m with 200m recoveries. The rest of the club were doing different sessions so I did this on my own. The 1k efforts were completed in around 3:26, a few seconds off what they should have been, once again this was down to having a pretty hard race a few days previously.

The next 3 days were unremarkable, a double easy day, a medium long 13 mile run and another recovery run on Saturday. The medium long run was pretty swift, as it was the first day I felt back to 100% after the weekend.

The conclusion to the week was a solo 20 mile long run, with the last 14 run at marathon pace (or thereabouts!). As soon as I started the warm up part of this session I knew it wasn’t going to be easy, Fridays medium long run was still in my legs and it took the full 6 miles just to loosen up.

The MP portion went okay for the first 10 miles, a few slower miles here and there but a few faster ones as well. Miles 12 and 13 really started to slow down (6:23 and 6:30), but I fought back and turned in a final 6:14 split. The average pace for the entire MP session was 6:18.

I was hoping to make this final race pace session bang on 6:15 but I’m not really that worried. It was at the end of a peak mileage week and 7 days after a half marathon which averaged 5:53, so I know I am more than capable of running faster!

Next week is a slight cut back in mileage and the SEAA 12 stage road relays in Milton Keynes on Sunday. I ran one of my best ever times at the relays last year, so am looking forward to what should be another fun day out.

It will also be just 4 weeks to race week 🙂

Week 6 summary

Mon – Rest
Tue – Rest
Wed – 4 miles easy (7:16m/m)
Thu –  6 miles general aerobic (6:39m/m)
Fri – 13 miles medium long (7:07m/m)
Sat – 4.5 miles recovery (7:42 m/m)
Sun – Bath Half Marathon (5:53m/m)

Total – 41 miles

Definitely a week of two halves, injury and two days rest at the beginning, and a solid half marathon at the end!

I woke up on Monday with a very stiff leg, the result of a 24 mile run with a mild hamstring strain. I was anticipating a day of rest anyway, so wasn’t too worried and did some stretching and icing to help it recover. Tuesday saw a slight improvement, but still pretty stiff so I took that as a rest day as well.

On Wednesday things were feeling a lot better so went for a short 4 mile run, confirming I was back in shape. Thursday saw a nice mid pace 6 mile run to get the legs moving again, and Friday was a fast-ish medium long run of 13 miles. Overall, a couple of days rest at the start of the week were probably a good thing (even though they were enforced due to injury).

Saturday was a short jog round Elthorne Park with Matt (who has his own injury problems to contend with), leaving plenty of energy for…

The Bath Half Marathon

This was a really important race for me, as it would be the best indicator of how effective my marathon training has been.

At the Cardiff half in October I faded quite badly in the last 3 miles, probably due to an overly fast start and an unexpected hill at mile 10. I wanted to learn from those mistakes and put in a better performance at Bath.

I went into the race with a plan not to go off too fast and keep the pacing even for as long as possible. I stuck to that very well, with just a couple of slower splits (by 5 seconds or so) coinciding with undulations on the two lap course.

This plan paid off in spades in the last 3 miles, I felt very strong and picked up the pace significantly, dropping quite a few other runners. I also put in a good sprint to the finish, determined to duck under 78 minutes as the clock ticked down on the gantry.

Chip time 77:53, a PB by 2 minutes. I also placed 95th, not bad for me 🙂

Splits – 5:50, 5:54, 5:54, 5:53, 5:54, 5:52, 5:57, 6:00, 5:54, 5:58, 5:49, 5:45, 5:51, 1:14.

Week 7 summary

Mon – 6 miles easy (7:27m/m)
Tue – 8.2 miles general aerobic (6:54m/m)
Wed – 12 miles inc 7 mile tempo @ 6:02 (6:33m/m avg)
Thu –  AM 6 miles easy (7:16m/m) PM 4 miles easy (7:32m/m)
Fri – 15 miles medium long (7:13m/m)
Sat – 5.3 miles inc 2.2 miles cross country relay (6:52 m/m avg)
Sun – 24 miles long run (7:35m/m)

Total – 80.5 miles

7 weeks to go, and this was a peak mileage week with a couple of key sessions.

A gentle start to the week with an easy 6 miler on Monday and a progressive 8 miles on Tuesday, just keeping things ticking over for the 7 mile tempo run in the diary for Wednesday.

The tempo session was sandwiched in the middle of a 12 mile run, and turned out pretty well. I decided to take it a tiny bit slower than the last tempo run, 7 miles tempo equates to around 45 minutes of hard running, and taking advice from Jack Daniels Running Formula again I aimed for 6:08m/m. Well, once I started that pace seemed too slow so I settled for 6:02 instead 🙂 Kept this up all the way through, and was happy to complete a good long tempo session without any difficulties.

Thursday was a double, two laps round Wormwood Scrubs in glorious sunshine at lunchtime for 6 miles, and another 4 in the evening completed the day. Friday was my weekly medium long run, and the 15 miles went by easily. The only downside was a slightly sore hamstring in my right leg, which was to trouble me for the next few days.

On Saturday it was the 61st running of the Horsenden Hill Cross Country relays, organised by our club and thought to be the oldest XC relay in the world! It used to be a grand affair with many big names from British athletics taking part over the year, but now it’s a slightly diminished event with far fewer numbers in attendance. With 6 laps for the men’s event, and a little over 2.2 miles per lap it’s a good chance to really let fly. I was quite happy with my race, clocking 12:20, which is 5:32 m/m pace. Unfortunately many of our fast runners were injured or unavailable, so we only came in 5th overall.

Sunday was dedicated to the longest long run of the build up. I ran this solo and in the rain, though that wasn’t really a problem. Right hamstring was feeling a bit sore and tight still, so I decided to run a looped course in case the it got seriously worse and I needed to cut things short. After a bit of thinking I came up with a course of 2 x 9 mile laps, followed by a shorter lap of 6 miles. Mentally this worked well as the promise of a short last lap made it all seem that bit easier 🙂

Pacing wise I just took it quite easy, not wanting to blow the hamstring. Although the splits look a bit erratic, this is mainly because of a few stiles and other obstacles at certain points along the course. The effort around these was even pretty much throughout the run.

Hamstring problems aside, I’m quite happy with this run. It didn’t feel particularly hard and I could have gone on longer without much trouble.

I might take a rest day tomorrow to give the hamstring a chance to recover, some regular icing and stretching should sort it out. I want to be in good shape for the Bath Half next Sunday…