The one bit of news is that I am starting to feel good now. That needs to be taken with a pinch of salt at the moment because the objective numbers, especially the HR, don't entirely back this up, but the subjective feeling is all good. If I didn't run with a GPS watch I would swear that all is well now and I am recovered from Turin (plus Cork). I know from previous 24 races that it takes about 4 months for the numbers to get back to normal, basically a day per mile raced, and since recovery from Turin has been extra slow so far I expect this to take even longer. If it's 5 months then I'll be back to my best pretty much the day I'll race the Spartathlon!
Anyway, since Cork has only been just over a week ago, I am still taking it easy, at least so far. I think I'll test the waters with a few faster miles in a few days and I'm planning on doing an evaluation next week, which will hopefully see an improvement since the last one. I have been rebuilding the distance after a few very short days following Cork but I'm basically back to normal now.
My left knee keeps being a bit of a worry; I did not feel it at all during Cork but the discomfort came back after a few days. I could feel it yesterday (Tuesday), but today it's pretty much unnoticeable, except when I specifically think about (i.e. now!) . It is never bad, yesterday I gave it a 3 out of 10 on the pain scale, which is still well below the level where I start considering doing something about it. So far I'll do what I always do - I ignore it, apart from the odd bit of whinging every now and then. This approach seems to work for me.
8 miles on Sunday, 10 on Monday and Tuesday, 12 on Wednesday. The pace keeps zoning in on 8-minute miles, the effort is always easy, the HR a bit up and down, definitely higher than I would want it to be at times. I find it hard to slow down when the watch starts beeping at me when I'm already running at such an easy effort and sometimes I ignore the alarm for longer than it would be advisable. I do feel a lot better than 2 or 3 weeks ago, so I'm a bit more daring when it comes to running a tad faster.
I'll try to remember that I ran a marathon 9 days ago, never mind 134 miles 2 months ago.
- 7 Jun
- 8 miles, 1:03:45, 7:58 pace, HR 144
- 8 Jun
- 10 miles, 1:21:58, 8:12 pace, HR 139
- 9 Jun
- 10 miles, 1:20:00, 8:00 pace, HR 143
- 10 Jun
- 12 miles, 1:36:26, 8:02 pace, HR 145
Could the warmer weather be shifting your HR higher for a given pace?
ReplyDeleteYesterday it was in the 20's for the first time this year, and during my long run I couldn't keep my HR down in the last hour - it was 15 to 20 bpm higher than normal for the pace. Fingers crossed I'll adapt to the heat before race day...
3 out of 10 would be pleasurable for you!
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