Too Much Too Soon

I've never had a problem with motivation, that's for sure. The problem was generally going too far the other way, and this time I really seem to have overdone it. In my attempt to make changes after that disappointing result in Belfast I got a coach, started strength training, did yoga, started cycling to work - and then it all became a bit too much.

Sunday's run should have been a warning. From the first step I felt lousy. The legs were stiff and heavy, the pace was exceptionally slow and nothing clicked. I've felt this way plenty of times but usually it settles after a mile or two and I eventually start enjoying the run. Not so this time, it pretty much sucked from start to finish and I was actually shocked when I realised just how slow I had run.

A recovery day on Monday was just what was needed and I felt much better, so I chalked Sunday off as one of those days.

It all came back to me on Tuesday. The speed workout was actually fairly mellow: alternating 2 minutes of 5k and 10k/HM effort, 4 times. That's just 16 minutes of work and obviously a lot less strain than, say, a 5k race.

I sure did get the effort wrong!

Part of the problem was that the watch was slow to catch on the pace and I kept seeing 6:40 or 6;45 pace, which surely is not 5k pace, not even right now. At least that happened on the first speed segment, I'm not even sure if I kept checking the watch after that. But the pattern was already set, I kept working very hard on the 5k segments and then the HR barely came down a couple of beats at the slower segments, providing no respite - after the third segment I just could not keep it going any longer, stopped running and went hands on knees for a while just to stop myself from toppling over. Obviously I should have cut my losses at that point and gone home but for some reason I decided to do the 4th segment after all, even though I was perfectly aware that the coach any coach worth that description would have frowned on that. It was even worse after the fourth segment, I actually ended up lying down in the middle of the road to catch my breath.

Ok, at that point I could not fail to see that I was digging myself into a hole at rapid rate. I stopped the extra training, including the cycling, which had the immediate side effect that my quads stopped hurting. My recovery run on Wednesday was actually perfectly fine, so I think I'm alright as long as the level doesn't get over a certain threshold. I guess I need a reality check on my present 5k pace - even now, looking at Tuesday's data it doesn't strike me as particularly fast, though it clearly was too fast on the day.

The coach will have her input. I didn't envisage the first crisis to come so soon!

17 Jul

10 miles, 1:28:36, 8:51 pace, HR 143

18 Jul

4 miles, 37:49, 9:27 pace, HR 129

19 Jul

5 miles, 40:57, 8:11 pace, HR 152

   6:23/6:57 6:31/7:16 6:10/HOK 6:04/XXX

20 Jul

4 miles, 37:11, 9:17 pace, HR 132