Sunday, December 06, 2009

Training Week Commencing 30th November 2009

Monday
AM: 30 recovery @ 8:10 per mile (shattered so ran at lunchtime and had lie in)
PM: 70:02 steady @ 6:46 (Stortford loop after work - roads)

Tuesday
AM: 40 recovery @ 7:58mm (totally frozen so ran a little quick to warm up)
PM: 15 wund, 7 x 1300 (110) target 75/lap (4:04) - 4:05,02,02,04,04,05,03 - on a 6 minute loop, totally solo so hard work but enjoyed it and pleased to complete the session.

Wednesday
AM: 40 recovery at 8:46mm
PM: 75:30 @ 7:22mm - town loop, soaked through then with 2 miles to go a car threw a wall of water up at me. Almost forgot- was my birthday as well! Had a fairly quiet one- weird not being with uni buddies for it for first time in 4 years...

Thursday
AM: 40 recovery @ 8:34- interesting that pace of these stayed so low this week- usually a few 9mm+
PM: 15 wu,20wd 2 mile tempo, 4 x 400, 2 mile tempo, recovery of 2 between everything, first tempo easy at 10:40, 400s 63,64,64,65 (target 64) which was very pleased with, second tempo at 10:52- similar effort but slightly slower pace.

Friday
AM: REST- Herts Phoenix Awards evening, picked up the Long Distance performance award for third time getting it back from Lee! - bit of a mockery picking up an award basically for the club 10,000 record of 32:15 when there's a bloke who's run 28:odd sitting in the audience.

Saturday
AM: 15 wu with Ian, Old Blues race (21:49 - 3rd), then 46:31 mad sprinting around the Blues course for men and women cheering them on.

Sunday
AM: Hangover, drive home.
PM: 1:53:16 @ 7:24mm - meant to be a two hour run but after having run so long supporting yesterday coach said to pull it back in - went on a very enjoyable new route and reminded me how many great tracks there are where I live that I still haven't found- was on road for about 4 miles and could easily have cut most of that out. Did get a bit lost and pace suffered as was sub 7 whenever I was on the roads at a similar effort.

Total: 621 minutes ( ~ 83 miles)

Biggest week in about 3 years whilst working full time and coped with it very well right now- particularly that none of the runs were over 9 minute miling which for me is incredibly rare (and might mean miles are closer 85 or so) - two quality sessions and one of my better races - if I can adapt to running at this level regularly I know I'll step up a level in my racing. It's still relatively low mileage compared to most but given injury problems it'll be a couple of years before I can seriously consider regular 100+ weeks- right now if I can average 75 or so for my training weeks with a 40-50 on my rest weeks I'd ve very happy and can make considerable progress.

Awesome to see the Oxford men and women run so well and win so convincingly. Especially Johnson stepping up at the last moment, Andy making up for last year's dissappointment with a stunning third place, and all of the freshers/first-timers in the men's team - who says you don't win anything with kids?! Also the veterans of the team Brucey, Franco and Mercer giving sterling performances. On the ladies side a whole host of awesome runs.

Quite pleased with my race ~10 from Hennessy and ~20 from Kimpton- given I'd had a John Smiths before the race I was shocked! Also very pleasing to beat down the two Cambridge reserves. Felt very relaxed during the race. Ian went out fairly quick with one idiot following him who promptly dropped back and finished way way back then the two Tab reserves following him. Group quickly built of a very relaxed Mr. Hennessey, Moulden and myself together with the first of the two tabs. he dropped off fairly quickly and at a similar time Andy accelerated a bit and reeled in the tab ahead - concious of my recent disasters I held back with Simon gradually reeling in the tab and settling into a good rhythm then with about 14 minutes gone, pretty much I think as we were approaching the butts, I just raised the pace a bit and gradually broke clear of the tab - hoped I was dragging Simon along but he wasn't quite there but still a good race and looks in top form - he was directing me on where to go for most of the race so if you're reading this Simon then thanks again! Could see Hennessey and unbelievably Kimpton not that far ahead but stomach was definitely not happy about the Smiths by this point so I didn't push too hard until I got onto the grass. Decision to go with shorter steeplechase spikes seemed to work and very pleased to be 40 odd seconds faster than last year- 10 secs/mile isn't a bad improvement! Oxford destroyed Cambridge with the Reynolds/Kimpton dream team thrashing the tabs for the second time in the term - okay- well Kimpton thrashed them I just managed to finish!

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Bryn Running

Training diary and musings on running in general.