Training And Recovery

It is just past 6 am on Friday morning and the Dingle pre-race nerves have truly taken over. I've been awake since 5 am, totally unable to sleep, thoughts of the race coursing through my mind. I very much doubt I will be able to sleep much tomorrow, so that's basically it.

Somehow, on an emotional level, I don't feel prepared because I haven't done much training over the last 7 weeks, even though rationally I know perfectly well that it's what I've done over the last 7 years that is much more important and will get me through the race. Anyway, I'm not even planning on racing this, this is a fun run and I am out to enjoy the 50 miler for the last time.

To alleviate my fears, I can look at my this:

This is a very simple graph where I plot the ratio of pace and HR. It ignores any other variables, including distance or temperature, which explains a few of the dips (usually long runs, where the HR tends to go up for the same pace as the miles are building up), but the general trend is obvious.  I wish I had such a nice upwards gradient every month! It clearly shows how recovery is progressing after I returned to running after Belfast. This graph is for the month of August and the early September figures are showing further progress.

My legs are fine.

The Dingle Ultra this Saturday will obviously have an impact on recovery. After that I have almost two months before the Dublin marathon, but since I am running that one as a pacer and not all-out, recovery will be significantly quicker.

Training this week has been fairly low-key, I ran up Windy Gap on Tuesday, a day earlier than usual to give me 3 easy days before Dingle. The rest was easy running and with a reduction in mileage since Wednesday. I've done this before and I'll be just fine - so why can't I sleep!

1 Sep

10 miles, 1:19:16, 7:55 pace, HR 135

2 Sep

10.8 miles, 1:33:20, 8:38 pace, HR 139, Windy Gap

3 Sep

7.5 miles, 58:35, 7:48 pace, HR 139

4 Sep

8 miles, 1:03:19, 7:54 pace, HR 137