Thunderstruck

I wasn’t quite sure if I would really be up for this weekend’s training after Friday’s very long and rather fast long run, but I wasn’t unduly worried either. After all, Saturday’s 90 minutes run is for recovery purposes; I can just jog along at easy pace and enjoy the scenery, right? Well, wrong, as it turned out. To start with, the weather was rather changeable. I woke every hour or so because yet another big rain shower kept hammering at the window, and the wind never stopped. It looked a bit friendlier than expected at 8:30 in the morning, and the devil’s elbow loop, with its sheltered parts, seemed to be perfect for a day like this.

I got going, but for some reason didn’t really get into recovery mode. I kept pushing the pace, just a little, but noticeable. Maybe it had something to do with the discussion on Andrew’s blog a few days ago, where Mike pointed out that his Mystery Coach is very much against “too-easy” recovery runs. Hmm. This might have got stuck in my head, and maybe that’s why I kept pushing. Anyway, after completing one loop I had plenty of time left and headed towards Ard-na-Sidhe rather than home. I had heard a few “thundery” noises before but since thunderstorms are very rare around here I didn’t really believe that a storm was brewing. I changed my mind when I saw a flash of lightning in the not-too-far distance, followed by a massive thunder. All of a sudden I was worried, running in a thunderstorm is definitely something I don’t want to experience. I turned around immediately and tried to get home as fast as I could, but in the 20 minutes it took to reach our driveway the wind had already blown the storm clouds away and the sky was blue again. Since it was safe again I added two more miles to the run before I got home.

As it turned out, I had run at sub-8:00 pace, which under no circumstances whatsoever can be described as a recovery run for me. I thought I would find out the next day how much that would affect my legs.

Sunday is the day of my fast tempo run. On the Lydiard schedule that I used to come up with my own training plan, this should be on Thursday. However, I have never managed to get the legs moving fast enough on Thursday, but never had particular problems on a Sunday. I think the reason for this is that Sunday’s run is a full three days after the previous tempo effort, while the other two tempo runs are just two days after the previous one. I seem to recover quicker from long runs than tempo runs, which would explain why Sunday is the day when my legs feel at their best. Well, I put on the DS-trainers again for the pace effort, waited 10 minutes to let the next rain cloud pass by, and headed out. It was quite windy, but I think I’ve written that for just about every run this winter. It was definitely manageable, so I headed for the Caragh Lake route. The quads complained a bit after three or four miles, but came round again eventually. Last week I did push my limits on that run. Today I felt better, it certainly didn’t hurt as much on the return leg, and I felt a lot stronger. I added a bit more distance, but I’m not quite sure how much. The pace definitely felt easier than 7 days ago, but might have been just a tad slower (depending on how accurate my guesses for the distance are). I was rather pleased with this effort; today sub-7 pace felt definitely manageable, and unlike last week I felt I could have continued on for a good bit longer.

The other Mike suggested it might be time for a recovery week. Maybe I’m gung-ho at the moment, maybe I’m foolish, but for the time being I’d rather continue with my consistently high mileage. The achilles troubles of the previous weeks seem to be receding (though I won’t be counting my chickens just yet on that score), and I just don’t feel like I need to cut back. Of course, should injury strike I won’t have anyone but myself to blame.

20 Jan: 12 miles, 1:34, 7:50 pace, avg. HR 148
21 Jan: 8.8 miles, 59:43, 6:47 pace, avg. HR 164

Weekly mileage: ~84.5 miles