An Unforgettable Birthday

I received an unexpected, and very much appreciated, bonus from the organisers of the Dublin marathon who hosted an evening to give a big Thank You to all the pacers. It was in Dublin, of course, but Niamh didn't need much of an excuse to have another drool over her new baby niece, so we found ourselves on the long road across Ireland again. This also coincided with my 42nd birthday, but unlike someone I did not feel the need to run my age in either miles or kilometers, even though the latter would have been rather appropriate.

What wasn't quite in the plan was all the warning lights in the car starting to flash, including a big red "STOP" across the dashboard, while we were on the motorway just past Port Laoise. This has always been a nightmare scenario of mine, especially with 4 kids in the car, a really dangerous situation. Luckily, despite all our financial woes, we never stopped paying our AA membership and they plucked us from the side of the motorway, literally, and organised a hire car while towing our own crippled car back to Kerry. We arrived three hours late and with only half of our luggage, but when we were standing in the rain on the hard shoulder, trying to get the children away from the cars whizzing by, arriving three hours late but all in one piece had seemed like a wonderful outcome.

I still don't know if our car can be repaired. I just spent 800 Euro last month on tax, a new battery and four new tires. Bugger. I can hardly afford a new pair of runners, never mind another car big enough for the 6 of us.

Anyway, we're all safe and sound, the dinner in Dublin was great, the baby niece got plenty of admiration and now we're back home again as life goes on.

I did my final hill workout on Friday, and yes, I'm glad to be done. I did the usual sprints, high knees and thigh drive, and a set of downhill strides for good measure.

Most weekends in the coach's plan consist of back-to-back workouts from here on. I ran to Deer Park on Saturday, doing 8 loops, 10 seconds faster than marathon pace. The hilly park made this a bit tricky and I had to rely on feel rather than the watch. What I ended up with were 8 miles at 6:39 pace, just about right even if the HR was a bit lower than expected. What was remarkable was how fresh I felt, I was so comfortable at that pace and could have gone on for much longer.

This set me up nicely for Sunday. The original marathon plan called for about 2 hours with the last 40 minutes at marathon pace. However, since I'm not training for a marathon I reasoned that I should train a bit slower, closer to Connemara pace, but since I would not get as much out of the training run by running slower, the faster part should be longer. Does that make sense? I split the runs into two equal halves, an hour easy and an hour steady.

I took the scenic route to Cabinteely Park (well, if you describe Ballybrack as scenic) and arrived there just in time for the second part. Cabinteely is even more hilly than Deer park and I once more had to go by effort. I averaged 7:20 for the first mile and steadily got a little bit faster with each successive loop. With about 25 minutes left I turned homewards, the average pace now at 7:10, but that was down to 7:07 by the time I was done.

Despite the fact that I had gone into this run with pre-fatigued legs I was always running well within myself, and I definitely felt that I could have gone on like this for just about forever. But here lies the problem. The coach has always warned me that the brain does not register fatigue properly when you're reaching peak state. That's great for racing but not so great when you need to judge the effect of training without burning out your legs. Connemara is still 10 weeks away. I really need to be careful to rest and recover, even if I don't feel like it. A couple of easy days are in store, even on seemingly fresh legs.

Incidentally, the plan for Donadea in 3 weeks' time is pretty much an extended version of today with an easy first and a steady second half. It will take a lot of patience and a lot of swallowed pride when I see runners steaming away from me when I know I could easily keep up. I'm not entirely sure if I'll be able to slow down. I didn't manage it in Sixmilebridge, but at least there won't be the prospect of a win tempting me in Donadea.

26 Jan

8 miles, 1:03:44, 7:58 pace, HR 131

27 Jan

10.5 miles, 1:32:31, 8:48 pace, HR 138
   Hill drills: 4x30 sec sprints; thigh drive (4 mins); downhill strides (3x200 m); high knees (4 mins)

28 Jan

10.5 miles, 1:12:27, 6:54 pace, HR 158
   incl. 8 miles @ 6:39 pace

29 Jan

16.5 miles, 2:02:48, 7:26 pace, HR 142
   incl. 1 hour @ 7:07 pace

Weekly Mileage: 75