Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Training Week Commencing 21st December 2009

Reasonably starting week before losing it to a knee niggle - started building back up after two days out.

Monday
AM: 35 at 8:03 per mile- v. icy, was an awful journey back home from Gran's as we went south for Pistol's funeral (really nice ceremony- particularly good songs which really exemplified Pete's attitude to life) - then got caught in an awful snow storm coming back up the M11. 8 or 9 hours in the car.

Tuesday
AM: 38 recovery at 8:53- loads of snow
PM: 58:41 (5:52mm) for 10 miles on treadmill at HR 153 avg- just set it at 6mm and then at about 4 miles started adding 0.1 occasionally until ramping it up for a 5:20 final mile.

Wednesday
PM: 118 minutes at about 7:40mm - did first hour and a quarter and knee started playing up a few miles before got back to clubhouse- rested a bit till everyone else was ready to go out and did an extra 45 which was probably a bad call...

Thursday
AM: Rest- knee sore- quad muscles v. tight pulling on it- not major but needs a day or two.

Friday
AM: Rest- knee improving but needs one more day- got the stick to try and sort it out for christmas!

Saturday
AM: Witham 5 cancelled so just go out for 40 easy at 7:17mm. Little bit of knee pain on way back but nothing like Wednesday. Felt awful going up the valley and very dizzy.

Sunday
AM: 60 easy at 7:39 per mile - relaxed run - knee fine and much better than yesterday- managed to get a last minute entry to Buntingford 10m the next day so hopefully tapered form won't go to waste. Enjoyable pint at Harvest Moon with Scott, Anthony and Tristan.

Total: 356 minutes / ~47.5 miles

Summary: Knee definitely ruined any chance of decent mileage but the two days have sorted it - for 48 miles to be a week with a niggle in it isn't bad- treadmill run was actually quite good- always pleased when I do actually jump onto a treadmill and run relatively hard- HR seems v. low though. Thankfully ran okay at Buntingford and now back to some decent mileage after two very easy weeks comprising a Christmas Break of sorts...

1 comment:

noel thatcher said...

Bryn, happy new year and thanks again for the imput with my project.
I have been reading through some of your old posts and am wondering, given your interest in "sustained speed" of the type epitomised by Moorcroft, Coe, aouita and co., if you have had the opportunity to hear my old coach and mentor, Jon Anderson speak on the subject of specificity.
Put in it:s most basic form this approach is based on the idea that if you want to run FAST then you train FAST. Two of our staple sessions in early winter would be 8x300 at 41/40 or quicker and 4x600 at 1.24./1.26. These would be repeated weekly , (the recoveries were 3 1nd 5 mins jog respectively). On the non-track nights we would usually do what you could clasify as tempo/LT2 type work such as "stepping stones", alternating miles of 6 and 5 mins for six miles, or 10 mins out and back, the instruction for this being "run out for 10mins as hard as you can and then run back faster"!!!
a staple Sunday when Dave was in full training would be a 15 mile run with Cov Godiva at 10 am, followed by tea and toast and then up to Perry Bar for a track sesion at 2ish consisting of the 600m reps above or sometimes 5x1k at around 2.30.
I remember running my first ever 10 miler with Pat Scammell who ran with us for a few seasons and clocked around 3.52 for a mile and closing in around 5.30 and we regularly raced the last mile of a run coming home at around 4.50.
All the above was in the context of around 80mpw. This was brutal stuff and there were quite a few casualties as with any programme but when i joinded the group in 83/84 there were five sub 4 milers including Dave who had run 13 mins in 82.
I firmly believe that it was this kind of work that produces athletes who WIN races and who have the physiological and neuro-muscular armoury to respond to pace changes etc. Much of what I see today seems to be as you descibe tit,"performance training", ie, "what do i need to do to run 31.00 for 10k, 4.00 for 1500 etc( I am a big fan of Coe/Horwill.s five pace theory as well)
Sorry for the long comment but hope you find it thought provoking.
Noel

Bryn Running

Training diary and musings on running in general.