On Tuesday my left knee hurt.
On Wednesday my left calf felt very tight
On Thursday my left hip hurt.
On Friday my right hip hurt.
On Saturday my left hip hurt.
On Sunday my calves are both tight, my right hip hurts and my hamstrings are feeling tight.
Goodness gracious me, I do hate tapering!
On Friday I intended to run 10 miles. I got up in time and got ready, only to decide at the very last minute to cut it down to 8. The Spartathlon was only a week away, which must have been on my mind I guess. That was when I mentally accepted that I was tapering, I guess but I had been taking it reasonably easy for a while already.
On Saturday I once again donned the 4 layers for my heat adaptation run. I can definitely tell that my body is adapting: my HR is lower, my pace is higher and the required effort level well down. Heat adaptation is supposed to last for about a week; I'll do one more just to keep it all topped up.
I went up to Windy Gap on Sunday morning. Ideally I would have swapped the weekend runs around but I did not have time for a mountain run on Saturday, real life not taking a break just yet. The weather was pretty wild when I left home and on the first climb up to Treanmanagh I was wondering what it would be like once I approached the Gap but in actual fact it calmed down considerably over the next few miles and it was almost pleasant. I took it easy and ran most of it on autopilot. If I can run that brutal climb up to the Gap on autopilot I must be in good form, I guess. On the way back home my calves felt unreasonably tight but when I tried to work on them with The Stick afterwards I could not feel any sore points.
This was the last run resembling a workout, I suppose. In 3 days we're flying out to Athens and in 5 days ...
- 17 Sep
- 8 miles, 1:05:32, 8:11 pace, HR 155
- heat adaptation
- 18 Sep
- 8 miles, 1:05:05, 8:08 pace, HR 139
- 19 Sep
- 8 miles, 1:04:52, 8:06 pace, HR 150
- heat adaptation
- 20 Sep
- 10.7 miles, 1:39:46, 9:19 pace, HR 142
- Windy Gap
Great to see the training gel over the last few weeks. I know the heat adaptation runs will be worth it, but no doubt it'll still be a bit of shock to the system when you get off the plane.
ReplyDeleteI can only guess trip preparation frenzy is now beginning. I'm bad enough when I do long ultra's here on my door step, can't imagine having to plan for foreign trip and racing bigger distances. Exciting times no doubt.
Good luck in Athens/Sparta.
ReplyDeleteYou sound prepared, Thomas. Best of luck with the race and the travel!
ReplyDeleteGood luck and enjoy trip, from all your clubmates
ReplyDelete