Twisting By The Pool

The song has absolutely nothing to do with running, except that for some reason it went round and round in my head for the entire two hours of Sunday's long run.

I was glued to the computer for most of Saturday, watching updates from the Spartathlon. Well done to Irish champion Eddie Gallen who, as ever, finished very strongly moving up the field towards the end at an almost scary rate. Well done as well to Anto Lee, race director in Staplestown and Donadea, who finished with 12 minutes spare, cutting it fine here mate! And I could not help but notice that a married couple, Reinhold and Regina Straßer, had run the entire race together - how romantic! I just need to convince Niamh and we're all set. Failing that, which, let's face it, remains a realistic possibility, I'll just have to run it on my own, hopefully next year.

Back here at home it was mostly business as usual, though my paces have picked up remarkably recently. The last 2 years it took me about 3-4 months to recover from the really long ultra races and I expected this year to be the same, which would have meant feeling fully recovered by about November. That does not seem to be the case; despite running the Dingle Ultra only 3 weeks ago the legs are feeling really good right now and training feels like fun rather than training, to the point where I'm wondering if this even qualifies as training because generally it does not feel like hard work.

Thursday was a little bit slower following Wednesday's long mountain run, though considering it was strictly a recovery effort I was pleased to see the pace slip under 8-minute pace, even if only by a few seconds. I was back out early on Friday, feeling possibly a little bit too good as the pace and the effort was a little bit higher than it should have been - ok, I admit it, I was chasing a Strava KOM in the middle and was knackered subsequently, probably not the smartest course of action in base training but good fun all the same.

I could feel my legs for the rest of the day but was pleased to see everything back in working order on Saturday morning. I was planning another easy 10 mile run but somehow the pace was a smidgen faster than on Friday, even with a lower effort. The HR was significantly lower as well, just goes to show how much one big push up a hill for a few minutes had messed up my legs for a whole day on Friday.

Still, I had probably run a little bit too fast because I did pay the price on Sunday. I felt pretty good for the first 10 miles but the remaining ones, especially the last 3, had me dragging my sorry backside home in a less than triumphant manner. Even the Dire Straits had gotten old after 2 hours.

25 Sep

10 miles, 1:19:56, 7:59 pace, HR 137

26 Sep

14 miles, 1:46:36, 7:36 pace, HR 149

27 Sep

10 miles, 1:15:55, 7:35 pace, HR 144

28 Sep

15.15 miles, 2:00:21, 7:56 pace, HR 144

Weekly Mileage: just under 78