It’s my Day

Even though it feels longer, my last race was less than 10 weeks ago, on New Year’s Day. On that day I managed to surprise myself by posting my first ever sub-20 5k, lowing my PR (itself only a few weeks old) by nearly one minute. It was a bit of a milestone, but of course to many runners the standard for being good is a sub-40 10k. I had never run a 10k before, and anyway, sub-40, while being there on the horizon, was still a long way away.

I have run a lot of miles in those 10 weeks, but nearly all of them at relatively slow pace, with hardly any speedwork. The training for the ultra had taken over, especially with those 20-20 double headers, which left no room for fast running. It was only in the last week that I added tempo runs to my training repertoire again. According to McMillan, a 19:52 5k translates to a 41:16 10k; accordingly, my target time for today was 41:00. I did dream of a sub-40, but since it was so much better that anything I’ve ever managed, I didn’t mention it to anyone, especially not on my blog.

It was a pretty miserable day, rainy and windy from the start, just as predicted by the weathermen. I left home at 11am – in fact it was the first time in ages when I didn’t get up early for my run, which was nice, truth to be told. The 65 miles drive to Adare was unremarkable, but once there I had a hard time to find the race HQ. I eventually parked the car and started walking. Adare isn’t very big, and I soon spotted a few runners and followed them to the registration building. (Note to the organisers: a sign would have been nice). After signing up, getting a t-shirt (as if I really needed yet another one) and getting changed I still had about 30 minutes to get warmed up. One look out of the door changed my mind, but the rain didn’t let up and with 20 minutes to go I started warming up. Is it still called warming up if it’s in the cold outside? The runners did gather around the starting line with a couple of minutes to spare, but there was a delay of about 10 minutes until we finally got going. The organiser did hold a speech while we huddled like penguins in the freezing rain, and eventually he relented and gave the signal to start.

For once I started very close to the starting line, but everyone around me set off at a furious pace. There were a few speed demons amongst us, but it wasn’t only them to take off like that, half the field seemed to stream past me. I did my best to ignore them and set my own pace. It’s the same in every race. I start slowly, and from about a third into the race I start picking off my victims. I expected this to happen again, but the fact is that I started overtaking after less than 2 minutes. A few of the runners were already breathing very heavily at that stage. What makes those people set off like that? Anyway, I felt comfortable, so much so that I did indeed question my pace. “It’s not hurting, shouldn't each mile in a 10k hurt?” However, I did pass the 1-mile marker in 6:27, which was reassuring. It was exactly the pace I had been planning. The next mile was into a fairly strong headwind, as well as mostly uphill, and I tried to draft as much as I could. It never lasted long, as soon as I settled right behind someone, the pace felt too slow, I went past, and the game started again with the next guy. Mile 2 went by in 6:31, considering the wind and the terrain I was happy with it. The next mile wasn’t as much into the wind, but even more uphill. I still picked up runner after runner, and then the biggest hill of all awaited. This was hard work, and the HR went up to around 185. It was at that stage that I noticed that the course seemed rather sparsely populated. There were three guys far ahead of me, and then so much of a gap in front of them that I couldn’t see anyone else. I guessed that I would spend most of the rest battling with those guys. We crested the hill shortly before the 3-mile mark, where a girl stood shouting encouragement “well done guys, the worst is behind you.” I had to laugh, we’re not even halfway and I expected worse things yet to come. Anyway, mile 3 went by in 6:28, which felt fast considering that hill. There was a bend in the road further on which I decided must be the half-way point, and I checked my watch.19:54. Hmm. Less than 20 minutes, I feel very strong, and the second half is bound to be downhill. Could it really be? I put those thoughts to the back of my mind and started hunting down my prey. By now I had closed the gap, one guy seemed to slow down, and by I went. I chased after the next one, and half a mile later I was ahead. By now one more runner from further ahead must have slowed down, and he fell victim before the 4 mile marker, which came in 6:23, the fastest mile yet. The last guy from that group turned out to be a much tougher opponent than the previous victims, and we spent the next mile battling for position. I surged to draw level, he responded to pull away again. On the next slight uphill I surged again, got right behind him, and once more he responded with a surge of his own. But I noticed he was turning his head to look behind, which I took as a sign of weakness. “He’s obviously worried about me. Let’s prove him right”. It was all the encouragement I needed, one strong surge and he was history. I have to admit he was very gracious in defeat. “Good man” he said as I went by. Honestly, there is no way I would have been as good a sport as that in his position. That battle had brought me to the 5 mile marker in 6:17 and I still felt great. One more guy appeared in front who had slowed down dramatically, and from there on I seemed to be on my own. We were now back in Adare, and with about half a mile to go I gave it all I got. Amazingly, mile 6 passed in 6:12, which is definitely the fastest mile I have ever run in my life. For the last bit I wasn’t sure if we were supposed to run on the road or the pavement. The pavement was slippery and I opted for the road. A car hooted at me. Was that supposed to be encouragement, or was he pissed off with me for being on the road? If so, then I didn’t give a damn. I was sprinting all out and finished the last .2 miles in 1:07 to finish in 39:27. I was ecstatic. I did calm down in time to congratulate my rival from the fifth mile, who was pleased with his time as well “not bad for a 49-year old”. But to me, it’s still my day.

I cool down, then go to the car to get changed. The second I close the boot (trunk to Americans) I go “sh*t, I just locked in my car keys!!!!” In desperation I go through my bag – there they are. Thank goodness for that! Being stranded in the pouring rain 65 miles from home would have put a dampener on my time. But it’s my day.

I go back to the racing HQ for some very welcome tea, biscuits and sandwiches, and then they start giving out prizes to runners randomly drawn from the list. And would you believe it, my name comes up, though I do get some ripping for my surname. I get a nice looking scarf for Niamh. It really is my day.

There’s a lesson in that race report: if you’re ahead, never look back. The encouragement I got from that was priceless.

Weekly mileage: 73.3 miles

11 Mar: 10 miles, including the Adare 10k in 39:27, 6:21 pace, avg. HR 178

Easy Does It

I intended to taper for three weeks, but if I look at my training schedule, it turned out to be more like three-and-a-half weeks. Because of tomorrow’s race I’ve been taking it easy since Wednesday’s long run, and apart from my last long run, coming this Monday, there won’t be any more particularly strenuous workouts in my way.

I pondered quite some time about the mileage for Friday. Originally I intended 15 miles, but then decided there was not much to gain at this late stage, and 15 miles 2 days before a 10k race could leave me with heavy legs; I settled on a relaxing 11 miles run. This had the added benefit of an extra half hour of sleep; to be honest, I needed that more than 4 additional miles. I went ahead with that, but I’m no longer sure what easy pace is for me; I run strictly by feel, and I can’t quite get my head around the fact that 8:00 pace feels so easy. Four months ago I was ecstatic to run a marathon just a whisker faster than that; now it feels a lot slower than marathon pace. But, with an eye on Sunday, I kept my legs in check, the only fast section being a set of 5x100 strides on the way home. Despite feeling so slow, the home stretch took only 43:10 (7:50 pace).

Pretty much the same was in store today, except that I ran a bit shorter as well as a bit slower. It was quite windy, but luckily the rain was reduced to a drizzle, and it wasn’t bad. I stopped wearing tights a few days ago; I should have done that at least 2 weeks earlier, because it’s been warm enough for shorts for quite some time. I just didn’t have the courage to try running with bare legs after that awful winter.

I guess running at such a relaxed pace will be good training for the ultra. I haven’t really got a clue what my ultra pace should be like, but naturally it’s slower than marathon pace. One part of me thinks starting the ultra at the same pace I’ve been running over the last 2 days should be just about right. You’re supposed to feel too slow for the first 10 miles at least. The other part thinks 8:10 pace would be much too fast. If I start at 8:10 pace, what would my average pace for the race be (assuming I won’t run into any major troubles)? 8:30? That would leave me with a 5:34 time, which would have been good enough for 11th place last year, and it just sounds too ambitious. I guess I’ll find out on race day.

Anyway, tomorrow is a different race. It looks like I will be able to test my hardiness in the rain. I’ll be sure to let you know.

9 Mar: 11 miles, 1:28:47, 8:04 pace, avg. HR 143, including 5x100 strides
10 Mar: 8 miles, 1:05:53, 8:14 pace, avg. HR 145

Looking Forward

For the last few months I have focused solely on the ultra, but I guess at some stage I have to look past that. Therefore I decided to sign up for another race, the Bantry Half marathon. I don’t know if I will be able to make it, because it’s only 5 weeks after the ultra, and somehow I can’t imagine being able to run again soon after pounding the roads of Connemara for several hours. But since the entry will close on 31 March I had to decide to sign up now, before I knew how I would feel after the ultra. If I feel like running on stumps (or if the mere thought of running will send me into a tailspin), I’ll forgo the race.

I finished my double headers last week, and I’ll run the last long run on Monday, so I had to decide how far I would run for this week’s long run, and when. I settled on 17 miles, mainly because that’s the length of one loop around Caragh Lake plus the Devil’s Elbow, and ran in on Wednesday to ensure sufficient recovery before Sunday’s 10k. After Tuesday’s tempo run the legs were as dead as expected, and the first mile saw me crawling at 9:10 pace. I did pick it up slightly, and went through the imaginary 3-mile marker in 26 minutes, 8:40 pace average. At that point the legs really wanted to speed up, but I told them to relax and that pace was not an issue today. They grumbled a bit, so I promised them to run the last 3 (flat) miles at a strong effort if they behaved through the series of hills that make up the Caragh Lake loop from miles 5 to 14. As a matter of fact the run went better and better with each passing mile, and when I came down the last hill with 3 miles to go I moved the effort up several notches, as promised. I felt fantastic, and not even the barking dogs could bother me this time. I don’t know how I did it, but I ran those miles in 21:15 (7:05 pace), which was faster than the tempo run the day before. I guess the 14 miles had served as a useful warm-up. Whenever I manage a run like that I question the accuracy of my mileage, but the answer is always the same, namely that it should be reasonably accurate. Even if it’s out, I still know that I’m improving, because I can still compare that time to previous times over the same course.

My achilles tendon started hurting again on Tuesday, which I presume was caused by the two tempo efforts in three days. As a result I decided to take it easy today and run very relaxed. I had planned two miles in a sprint/float fashion, but decided to cut that in half. I ran 4.5 miles at easy pace, then did the fast mile over the same course I had done the mile repeats on Sunday. I bet these workouts are easier on a track. For one thing, the road isn’t entirely flat, and sprinting uphill feels like someone is sucking the strength out of your legs with a straw. Secondly, how was I supposed to know when to stop sprinting and when to restart again? I did them purely by feel, and I guess the sprints were longer than 100 meters and the floats were shorter than the sprints, and the whole mile took 6:32. Interesting, that’s faster than the mile repeats on Sunday, though I have to point out that Sunday’s effort was strictly aerobic. I felt pretty good after that and was tempted to run the return mile in the same way but thought of my achilles and just jogged home.

I’ll take it seriously easy tomorrow and on Saturday, and I’m very much looking forward to Sunday. I have run a lot of miles since my last race, and I can’t wait to update my sidebar again.

7 Mar: 17 miles, 2:20:12, 8:14 pace, avg. HR 141, 3 final miles at 7:05
8 Mar: 8 miles, 1:06:12, 8:16 pace, avg. HR 141, 1 “mile” sprint/float in 6:32

P.S.: Note the heart rate. It’s still dropping!

Blowout

I experienced what was basically a flat tyre the other day; but not on my car, no, on my shoe. Those Nike 360s are cushioned on air, and one of the side panels blew, leaving me with a lopsided gait. Luckily it didn’t happen 5 miles away from home, or it would have been an uncomfortable ride back home. The shoe in question had lasted 498 miles, which is a decent mileage (in fact the second highest miles I ever accumulated on a pair), which is why it didn’t put me off trying the same pair of runners again. In fact, I already had an identical replacement in my shoe cabinet, because of a buy-one-get-second-half-price offer a few weeks ago. If the new pair holds as long as their predecessors, I’ll be happy enough.

Monday was all about recovery, not just from Sunday’s mile repeats but also from the double headers that still left a residue of fatigue in my legs. I ran at a very easy effort, and rather enjoyed myself. Later at work I chatted to a colleague who had run the 10-mile race in Ballycotton on Sunday (the same race that rejected my application), and who was slightly taken aback when he realised that his time for a 10 mile race was longer than mine for an easy 11 mile training run. I don’t know what he expected – he had done basically no training apart from playing football twice a week, plus two or three runs at about 6 miles several weeks ago. I wasn’t trying to show off, but of course I’m running faster than him. That’s the effect of training like a lunatic.

The weather has been abysmal over the last few days with torrential downpours basically all day – apart from the hour or so each day when I was out running, apparently. I can’t believe my luck. I woke Monday morning at about 3 o’clock to hear the storm ravaging outside and thought “if it stays like this I’ll bin the workout”. By 6 o’clock it was still very windy, but the rain had stopped, and didn’t restart until I had completed 10 out of 11 miles. Today was similar; the storm blew all night, but calmed down just in time for my run, only to pick up again for the last 5 minutes of the workout. I had planned a continuous tempo run, in contrast to Sunday’s mile repeats, and while the wind was strong enough to make it a bit tougher than necessary, the conditions were definitely acceptable. I managed an average pace of 7:15, which I was reasonably pleased about. As always the second half was about a minute faster than the first one, which meant that I ran the second 4 miles closer to 7:00 pace, though I didn’t quite reach it. I’m planning one more pace workout this week, probably a mile or two of 100on/100off or similar, just to get the legs moving a bit quicker for a bit without wearing myself out.

Shea, at the ripe old age of 5, has reached the existentialist phase of philosophy. How do you answer those questions: “If the world started with a Big Bang, who was there to hear it” or “Did God make the universe, or did the universe make God?” Maybe I should have shown more interest in philosophy when I had the chance.

5 Mar: 11 miles, 1:33:20, 8:29 pace, HR 141
6 Mar: 8.3 miles, 1:00:12, 7:15 pace, HR 155

Acceleration

After spending the last few weeks doing those insanely long double headers, I tried to inject a little bit of pace into my running. I don’t have time for an anaerobic phase, and I wasn’t planning on doing one anyway – I don’t see the point of anaerobic training for an ultra. But I do have an eye on the 10k next week. For some strange reason I’ve never run a 10k race before, so I guess it’s going to be a PR no matter what. On the other hand I don’t want an embarrassingly slow time on my sidebar, so I’d better get into gear.

Saturday was all about taking it easy after the combined 40 miles from the two preceding workouts. At least that was the plan, but not for the first time I found the legs moving faster than the head intended. I clearly remember the times when I had to go all out to run a workout at sub-8:00 pace, after all it’s less than 2 years ago. I still can’t quite get my head around the idea of running 11 easy miles and ending up with 7:45 pace. Sure, it wasn’t exactly recovery pace, but the effort was nice and relaxed, and I certainly didn’t strain myself. The only thing I added into the mix were 10 strides, and for the first 3 or 4 it felt as if I were running through a swamp. The legs weren’t tired as such, but they felt very stiff and slow moving. They did loosen up eventually, and maybe that’s what caused the pace increase on the way home. The weather was very nice, btw. For the first time in months I brought along a pair of shades, and I got good use out of them too. It didn’t stop me from being caught by one of those scattered rain showers towards the end of the run though.

I added a few hours working in the garden after lunch, and could gradually feel my left hamstring tighten up. A wiser person would have stopped the yard work then, I guess, but I kept going for a couple of hours. Luckily there was no sign of trouble the next morning. I don’t quite understand my muscles, but as long as they keep propelling me forward, I won’t complain.

As mentioned at the beginning of this post, I plunged back into some faster paces for Sunday’s workout. I couldn’t decide between mile repeats or a continuous tempo run, but the weather made up my mind for me. The forecast had predicted rain and gusts of up to 70 mph, and while it never got anywhere as bad as that it was windy enough to send me back to Ard-na-Sidhe, and that automatically meant mile-repeats, back and forwards on the road between the kids’ school and the posh hotel. I did the same workout 3 weeks ago, so I had something to compare this one to. Back then I got slower and slower with each repeat and today I was determined to avoid the same mistake. I wanted to stay away from getting anaerobic, which meant heart rates in the high 160s for the early repeats and low 170s for the later ones, though I never use the heart rate monitor to dictate the pace; it’s strictly a tool for measurement. I concentrated on staying relaxed for the first effort and came through in 6:34, which felt good. I tried the same effort on the second repeat but was rather dismayed to clock a time of 6:50. Doubts started to appear in my mind, but I got slightly reassured when the third repeat was faster again in 6:45. After that uneven start the rest of the workout fell into place with splits of 6:43, 6:40 and 6:34. I’ve yet to learn to run them more evenly, but I preferred getting faster for the later repeats rather than slower. The average time was 6:41, about 4 seconds quicker then 21 days ago. I guess I would have taken that.

I’d like to think that I can run faster than that next Sunday, but if I have to strain to reach that pace during mile repeats with recovery breaks in-between, how am I going to manage in a continuous effort? That race-day adrenaline better be good stuff.

3 Mar: 11 miles, 1:25:25, 7:45 pace, avg. HR 149, including 10x100 strides
4 Mar: 10 miles, 1:16:10, 7:37 pace, avg. HR 155, 6 “mile” repeats in 6:34, 6:50, 6:45, 6:43, 6:40, 6:34

Weekly mileage: 86.5 miles

Twenty – Twenty

I was more than a little apprehensive about this particular double-header. All of you who suggested caution were right, of course. I was already pretty fit, and overtraining is worse than undertraining. Not only did my hip bother me, I had a cold, which wasn’t just constricted to the head, as the frequent coughs can testify. However, this was my last double header, and I thought that if I could just push through one more time, I can rest after that. So I set my alarm for 4:40 in the morning, and when the time arrived I got up and got ready. The scenery was spectacular, a nearly full moon, plenty of stars, and hardly a cloud in sight. It was so bright that I was tempted to leave the headlamp behind, but brought it with me as a safety device. Due to my hip complaints I chose the less hilly route on the western side of Caragh Lake, though it isn’t exactly flat; I guess undulating would describe it pretty well. It doesn’t have any killer climbs, though. I felt pretty good for the first 5 miles, then turned around, and felt even better on the next segment. Once I reached our driveway I quickly went back into our house to get some water (I really should have left a bottle outside), and sneaked out again before anyone would wake. The hip had started to become noticeable, and I decided to add two loops to Ard-na-Sidhe rather than go back to the lake, to give me the option of bailing out after 15 miles. I started to tire on that third loop, but I still felt pretty good, and since the hip mostly behaved itself I never seriously contemplated bailing out. The last loop went amazingly well. I upped the pace with 3 miles to spare, and two miles later all I could think of was “wow, I’ve never felt so good at mile 19”. I guess all those double headers are paying off, I’m markedly stronger than I used to be. I felt really good, and the 5 miles splits for that run were 40:34, 39:36, 41:18 and 39:15. It was particularly pleasing to run the last section at the fastest pace.

Today’s repeat performance was slightly less glorious. The pain in my hip is actually getting better. Jeff had sent me an email earlier this week, telling me how he'd had a very similar problem when training for his ultra on the hills, and how it got better within a week of running on flatter roads. It looks like I’m following the same pattern. Maybe I shouldn't jinx it by shouting it out loud, but I think I managed to just about stay on the right side of the training/overtraining fence. It can be a balancing act, and I definitely started to wobble, but I think I got away with it. Anyway, my workout today followed the same route as the day before, apart from remembering to leave some water on the driveway to be picked up after 10 miles. The first two 5-mile sections were about 1 minute slower than Thursday’s, but then I slowed down more and more, and the last loop was the slowest of them all. No negative splits this time, I’m afraid. I tried to up the pace again with 3 miles to go, but the legs were running on empty by then (or old mushrooms, if that’s your preferred analogy), and in the end I was just glad to come home while still being able to run upright. This time the splits were 41:06, 40:36, 41:20 and 42:28. Those double headers are tough, and I’m sure one or two more would do me good, but I’m out of time, the ultra is just 4 weeks away. There is a 10k nine days from now, and while it clearly is not the focus of my training, I still want to do well in it. Therefore I’ll take it easy towards the end of next week, run the race, and add one more long run the day after that before officially starting my taper. Let’s hope the various aches and pains will be gone soon after.

1 Mar: 20 miles, 2:40:43, 8:02 pace, avg. HR 145
2 Mar: 20 miles, 2:45:32, 8:16 pace, avg. HR 142

(P.S. It's highly satisfying to be able to note down 2 20-milers in a row like this)

Cough, Cough

The last few days have been remarkably similar. My cold is not shifting, and I don’t feel very well. On the other hand, it’s not bad enough to stop me from running or going to work, I just feel a distinct lack of energy. Each evening I wonder if I can go running the next day, but come early morning I’m out and about.

Tuesday was the day of my last hill session. I know that the hip pains are most likely connected to running on hills, but I didn’t want to miss the very last of those sessions, especially as I haven’t done as many of them as I probably should have. Can 6 sessions really make a big difference? (For the record, yes, I think they really pushed my pace). Plus, Sunday’s hill session was the only run in the last few days where the hip didn’t actually hurt. The drills themselves were as torturous as always, and after the last one I thought “that’s it, no more hill drills”, but was too knackered to actually celebrate. The fact that it was raining and windy didn’t help the mood either. I did the by now usual 4 repeats, with some bounding over the last two. Bounding really is something else. I tried to concentrate on pushing off forcefully and fully extending my legs, and within seconds my heart rate would shoot up to 180 and more. I couldn’t do it for more than 45 seconds without totally losing form.

I developed another problem on Monday evening, all of a sudden the outside of my right calf started to hurt quite badly. It was a strange problem. It hurt when I was standing, walking or even sitting. The one activity that didn’t hurt was running. It was bad on Monday, felt a bit better on Tuesday and has all but disappeared today, Wednesday. Whenever a runner develops a pain in the legs, it’s only natural to suspect a running-related problem, but I wonder if that particular pain was caused by something else, whatever “something“ may be.

Since I was still feeling under the weather I decided to take it really easy today. The weather forecast had been pretty good, but I when I woke in the middle of the night the rain against the window sounded like someone was playing with a fire hose in a wind tunnel. By the time I got up and left the rain was thankfully reduced to a drizzle, but the wind was still at gale force levels. Such conditions always mean the same thing, a trip to Ard-na-Sidhe. Thank God for that little piece of woodland, it’s the only road that’s somewhat sheltered from the elements. I did take it easy, and actually enjoyed the run, even when the rain started again.

I’m in a bit of a quandary now. I had planned the last of my long double headers for Thursday and Friday, but with my cold and my lingering hip problem that might not be the wisest of actions. Unfortunately I have to set the alarm if I intend to run, and I hate being woken at such an uncivilised hour without the firm commitment to do the workout. After all, who wants to sacrifice precious sleep for nothing? I’ll see how I feel tomorrow. A fortnight ago I ran 20 hilly miles as the second part of a double header when feeling like poop, and afterwards was glad to have done it. Because of my hip problem, tomorrow’s run would be over a reasonably flat course, and should be easier. In all likelihood I’ll get up early and run, and if I feel up to it, I’ll finish what I’ve started.

27 Feb: 4 hill repeats, 1:08:30, avg. HR 151
28 Feb: 7 miles, 58:36, 8:22 pace, avg. HR 145

Mileage for February: 292.5

Weekend Report

As predicted on Friday, Saturday’s run was very enjoyable. I am doing all kinds of workouts these days, hill running, mile repeats, long double headers, and sometimes it’s easy to forget that I’m doing this purely for the joy of running. I set out in the morning with the main aim of enjoying myself. I felt very stiff and slow initially, and that was confirmed when I passed the first (imaginary) mile marker in 8:40. I am always a slow starter, and I didn’t see the need to push any harder. However, the legs came round very soon after that, and running became both easier and faster. I started to inject some surges into the effort, every mile or so I accelerated for about a minute before dropping back to the old pace. I checked my clock once or twice and noticed that I kept getting faster, and reached the turnaround point (5.5 miles) in 42:40 (7:45 pace), which was sooner than expected, especially considering the slow first mile. I kept the surges going, and eventually the legs tuned into that higher pace all by themselves, without me really intending to do so. I felt very good, kept smiling and running, and completed the second 5.5 mile stint in 39:48 (7:14 pace). I’m not kidding myself and pretend that it was an easy run. It wasn’t, I definitely kept pushing the pace, but it wasn’t a tempo effort either, despite the fact that a year ago this would have been a slightly ambitious pace for a hard tempo run. I have gotten faster yet again in the last few weeks, and I think it’s the hill repeats that are responsible for that. Coming back to my original point, doing technical stuff like hill or mile repeats might not nearly be as enjoyable as a straightforward run like today’s, but if they make me faster and stronger like this then they’re definitely worth the effort.

Since this was supposed to be a 90-minute run, and I was back home nearly 8 minutes early, I added a cool down mile, something I probably should do more often, but never do. Unfortunately, not everything was plain sailing. I got some pain in my right hip over the last 2 miles, and it was fairly sore. I had noticed it towards the end of Friday’s long run, but had hoped it would go away again. However, it was worse on Saturday.

Sunday saw me back on the hills again, for another set of 4 hill repeats. I planned on performing the same workout as on Tuesday, mostly steep hill running with some bounding thrown in for the last two repeats. Each repeats lasts less than 4 minutes, but 4 minutes can be a very long time when you’re being tortured like that. I didn’t quite make the 90 seconds of bounding I had hoped for, both times I cut them after 60 seconds and switched back to steep hill running. Sometimes I don’t have the strength, either in the legs or in the minds. On the plus side, the hip problem didn’t even register.

Today I’ve got a sore throat again. Niamh’s sisters were here over the weekend (to the delight of the kids, especially Cian), and brought some unwanted germs into the house. Today all the kids are coughing, and Daddy isn’t feeling too great either. It didn’t stop me from running, but it did stop me from feeling at my best (at least I’m blaming the cold rather than the hill repeats). I went out with the same mindset as on Saturday, to enjoy 90 minutes of running on a reasonably flat course (well, with just a few climbs thrown in for variety). The first mile was even slower this time in around 9:00, and I put in the same surges. I didn’t quite speed up as much, and covered the 5.5 sections in 44:52 (8:10 pace) and 40:20 (7:20 pace). It kind of validates last Wednesday’s mileage though. Back then I had doubts if I could have run 7:15 pace at that effort. I have more or less repeated that twice since then, which points to the possibility that Wednesday was indeed as fast as originally calculated.

Alas, my hip hurt again, and more so than on Saturday. I googled a bit, and it might be bursitis, which generally affects runners (check!) who run a lot of hills (check!) and on hard surfaces (check!). I’ll try icing, stretching, and flatter routes over the next week (apart from tomorrow’s hill session, that is), and will hope to cure it that way. The other option is ibuprofen, but I generally avoid stuff like that as much as I can.

24 Feb: 12 miles, 1:30:46, 7:33 pace, avg. HR 151
25 Feb: 4 hill repeats, 1:10, avg. HR 148
26 Feb: 11 miles, 1:25:12, 7:44 pace, avg. HR 144

Weekly mileage: 85.5 miles

Shouldn’t this be getting easier?

Good God, was I glad when I finally stumbled back into our house today after the run. I really was at the end of my strength. Not for the first time I did wonder if I had bitten off more than I can chew, but those thoughts are usually forgotten come the next workout. These double headers are tough, no doubt about it. I guess that’s the point, though.

Niamh gave me a bemused look when I said I was off to bed at 9:30 Wednesday evening. I knew I would need my sleep, and for once I went to bed on time. I’m usually very disciplined regarding running-related things, but going to bed on time is the one exception to that rule. But I sure was glad that I had bucked that trend for once when the alarm clock went off at 4:45 next morning. As I got ready I checked the weather outside. Luck was on my side; the gale force winds had blown themselves out already, leaving just the rain behind. It was drizzly early on, but that soon turned into a heavy downpour, soaking me to the bones. The heavy rain lasted for about an hour, and for the rest of the run it scaled back to a steady drizzle. I was a bit worried that the wind might pick up again and ran 3 loops around the devil’s elbow again rather than risk being stranded miles away from home on the far side of Caragh Lake. That fear proved to be unfounded, but it also meant more hills that way, especially the big, steep climb up to the ridge of the hill. Doing it once is easy by now, doing it twice is harder, doing it three times is a challenge. On the second loop a dog started barking at me. That was at least one mile away from the nearest dwelling, I have no idea how it got there. It sounded like a big dog and I was a bit worried at first, but as I got close I could see that he wasn’t actually out on the road but in a field, separated from me via a fence. I could hear his angry barks for some time, but that didn’t bother me. The last few miles started to drag a bit, but I finished feeling pretty good. I was a bit surprised when I calculated my average pace, the effort felt faster than about 8:30. Maybe the distance is slightly off, but it’s the opposite problem to Wednesday, when I thought that I might have over-estimated the miles. But, as Marc rightly pointed out, a few tenth of a mile don’t make a difference come race day, and 20 miles is what I put down into my log.

I managed another early night, and once again felt pretty well rested at 4:45. The weather was a carbon copy of Thursday, it started as a drizzle, turned into a torrential downpour for an hour or so and eased off again, maybe not quite as much as the day before. I felt a bit chilly at times due to the wind, but I don’t seem to catch colds that way. I used to be worried about getting sick running in those conditions, but I have completed so many runs like that this winter that I’ve stopped worrying. The only times I got a bit sick this year was when the kids brought home some germs, and none of those episodes were bad enough to miss even a single day of running. I did feel a bit weary from the start of this run, and this was confirmed when I ran the first loop a whole three minutes slower than yesterday. I though “well, I’ll be late for work” and just kept going. The climbs were definitely tougher than the day before. At mile 6 I got some hunger pangs, and that was repeated about 5 miles later, but I managed to ignore those feelings until they went away again. From the halfway point on I was definitely tired. I guess my glycogen stores were running empty, and my usual muscle fibres were fatigued. Mike’s Mystery Coach uses fast double headers to get the usual fibres fatigued in order to get new fibres conditioned. I guess my slower but longer double headers fulfil the same role. That’s good as far as development is concerned, but you can take it from me, it’s not pretty at the time. At the 12.5 mile point, at the end of the second loop, I was definitely knackered and ready to go home, but managed to push myself to begin the third and final loop. The climb was hard work – very hard work. If you believe Mike, all my muscles had to work with were mouldy old mushrooms, and they didn’t like the taste. There was nothing to do but to go on and on and on, and eventually I crested the summit, and while the rest of it wasn’t exactly plain sailing, it was manageable. Right when I felt worst, the mp3 player chose a song by Nickelback, and one line of the lyrics went “Are we having fun yet?”. It was good timing, and brought a smile to my face.

To add to the pain, I got some friction burns on my neck from the shirt (hmm, they're bright red, but it doesn't really show in that picture). I’ve worn that same shirt dozens of times before, I haven’t changed my washing powder or anything else that would explain why it suddenly started hurting, but it did. And it wasn’t only my shirt, the chest strap of my heart rate monitor did the same to my left side, which is just as inexplicable. Unsurprisingly in that context, I also got some good old-fashioned chafing. Has my skin gotten soft all of a sudden? Sure, I spent over 5-and-a-half hours running in the rain on Thursday and Friday, but I still wouldn’t expect that reaction.

Whatever the reasons, I’m definitely looking forward to tomorrow, when I can just run comfortably over a flat course and without having to get up at some ridiculous time. It will be a breeze.

22 Feb: 20 miles, 2:49:09, 8:27 pace, avg. HR 148
23 Feb: 20 miles, 2:54:12, 8:42 pace, avg. HR 142

Calm Before the Storm

The last few days have been miserable as far as the weather is concerned, wind and rain, rain and wind, wind and rain … apart from the 2 hours when I was out running apparently, because I didn’t get rained on once. Maybe it was a miracle, but in all likelihood I will pay for this tomorrow, when gale-force winds and heavy downpours are in store again (together with the flood warnings that always accompany that kind of weather). Lovely. I’m already dreading tomorrow’s long run.

Tuesday saw a quick return to the hill for another torture session. I gave myself a few extra minutes, just to be sure to be able to complete the whole workout without having to worry about being late for work (again). I duly ran up that hill with those silly looking high steps for about 3-and-a-half minutes, only to be confused by my heart rate monitor, which gave a rather low reading of about 160. The same happened on the second repeat. Right, if I can’t get my heart rate up high enough that way, I’ll have to switch to bounding. The third repeat saw me doing 2 minutes of those high knees, then I switched styles. I tried to concentrate on a forceful push-off and extending my legs fully. I also noticed that for some strange reason I have a tendency of swinging my arms across my chest when doing that, so I tried to concentrate on correcting this as well. The good news was that the HR did indeed shoot up into the required 170s, the bad news was that I felt pretty much wiped out after that. I’m a sucker for punishment, and came back for a fourth time, but after 2 minutes of steep hill running and just over 60 seconds of bounding I gave up, the legs felt like falling off. As I said two days ago, there’s still room for improvement. I practically crawled the two miles home, but nevertheless consternation reigned once I checked my average HR for the workout. I was working my socks off, and all I have to show for is a 137? That’s the lowest heart rate I’ve produced in the whole training cycle, but rather than a nice easy recovery run it was a very tenuous hill circuit. I’m not sure what to think of that. Did I not work hard enough, or are those hill repeats primarily workouts for the muscles, and the cardio system simply isn’t taxed as much?

Whatever the answer, I was already looking forward to today’s run, just 60 minutes of joyful running on a reasonably flat course, without any interruptions like strides or goofy hill repeats. My legs felt better than following previous hill repeats (either I really wasn’t working hard enough, or I’m getting used to them), and the miles just flew by. I turned around after 31 minutes, at what I thought at the time was the 4 miles point. The return leg was even quicker; it took just a handful of seconds over 29 minutes for the same distance. Now the doubts started creeping in. Did I really run 4 miles in 29 minutes (7:15 pace) without even pushing the pace? That seems way too fast for such an effort. Sure, I wasn’t hanging around and ran at a good clip, but 7:15 seems too fast. I tried to remember exactly where I had turned around, but in the early hours of morning my brain had partially shut down (Shea had woken me early, cutting nearly an hour off my sleep, which didn’t help), and I couldn’t come up with a definite answer. Whatever the true distance, I put 8 miles into my log, but it might have been slightly less, and a question mark remains. Maybe I should get a Garmin after all.

20 Feb: 4 hill repeats, 1:11, avg. HR 137
21 Feb: 8 miles(?), 1:00:06, 7:30 pace (?), avg. HR 149

The Long Weekend

I was slightly worried how long it would take to recover from my double header, especially as I was slightly sick. I usually recover very quickly from long runs (much faster than from speed workouts), but I had never run nearly 40 miles in two days, and doing so when not feeling 100% healthy added to the uncertainty. As it turns out, I must have recovered pretty well; the signs of sickness are gone and the legs are still able to carry me on my workouts.

I usually head up the devil’s elbow on Saturday, but as I had covered that loop 5 times over the last two days I decided to change the scenery and ran the considerably flatter route along Caragh Lake instead. I used to regard that road as hilly, but my perception has changed in the last 4 months. The legs were very heavy to start with but got better as the run went on. I did decide to add a few fast strides, just to get the legs moving again after so many hours and miles at comparatively slow pace. The weather was nice, the road was empty and the workout was much better than I could have hoped for.

Since the recovery from my last hill workout had been so much better then the preceding week, I decided to add a second day of hills to my weekly schedule, and Sunday was the day that had to be changed. I decided that I should no longer push my luck as far as running on a private driveway was concerned, and chose a different road. It’s on the opposite side of the same hill, and leads up to a picnic area with a stunning view of Caragh Lake and Dingle Bay (and, judging from the used condoms off the far side of said area, can be used for a different purpose as well). I wasn’t going up that high, however. I decided that 3:30 was as long as I could manage of the steep hill running while still being able to lift those knees. After that I jogged along for a minute or so (on a still quite steep section, so I ran really slowly), before turning around. I did measure my heart rates, and found the readings quite interesting. The steep hill running pushed the HR up to 175, after a minute of further (uphill) jogging it was down to about 160, back at the bottom of the hill it was as low as 120, and the first set of 150m windsprints pushed it up to 165 again, each cycle taking about 10 minutes. That’s a greater disparity of heart rates than I would have expected. The steep hill running was really tough work, and despite that I decided to up the ante on the last one and halfway up the hill I switched to bounding. 90 seconds later I was reduced to a drooling wreck, the HR up to 180, feeling slightly nauseous and close to fainting. There is clear room for improvement here. On the way down one particularly masochistic part of my brain contemplated doing a 5th repeat, but the thought of Niamh’s scones was too tempting and I headed for home instead. I was pretty much wiped out for the rest of the day, but watching my beloved Manchester City reach the quarterfinals of the FA Cup for the second year in a row lifted my spirits no end (last year I had predicted it would take another 15 years to reach that stage of the competition again).

Unfortunately the brief interlude of acceptable weather turned out to be very brief indeed, the rain returned Sunday afternoon, and our driveway turned into a shallow swimming pool overnight. I was drenched as soon as I stepped out of the house today, and the legs decided to take it easy once more. I ran the old Ard-na-sidhe out-and-back route twice, and the splits for the 2.5 miles sections were about 22:00-20:45-20:15-19:55. Apart from the first part, when the legs were not quite cooperating I was reasonably pleased with the effort, especially with the fact that each section was faster then the previous one without any increase in effort. Tomorrow I’ll bound up that hill once more, and then I’ll mentally prepare for my next double header. The weather forecast is bad, but then what’s new.

17 Feb: 11 miles, 1:26:14, 7:50 pace, avg. HR 147, including 10x100 strides
18 Feb: 4 hill repeats, 1:10, avg. HR 147
19 Feb: 10.5 miles, 1:27:42, 8:21 pace, avg. HR 145

Weekly mileage: 83.5 miles (including 2 hill workouts)

Double whammy

I decided to up the ante once more and increase the distance for my double header. Last week I did 17 and 20 miles, this time I was aiming for 20 back-to-back. This would finally get me into long runs that cover the ultra distance, albeit over two days.

Things didn’t start out too well Thursday morning. Actually, my first mistake was going to bed late on Wednesday. I was just about to hit the hay when I realised that football was on TV, and against all expectations the Bolton vs. Arsenal FA Cup match proved to be too riveting to go to bed. As a result I got less than 6 hours of sleep. Then the zip of my running tights broke just as I put them on (the one over the right calf). I tried to fix it there and then but only managed to completely destroy it in the process. Luckily I had a second pair washed and dry. Then Shea woke and I got into an argument with him (“Turn off your bedside lamp again”. “No, I’m not comfortable”. “Turn it off”. “No, I’m not comfortable”. “It’s too bright”. “No, I’m not comfortable”. “You’ll wake up Cian”. “No, I’m not comfortable”. …) I gave up on the stubborn mule (he fell back asleep again for 30 minutes, then got up – at 5:30, to his mother’s disgust.) Eventually I managed to leave the house, 10 minutes late.

The weather forecast had predicted heavy rain, and they were right on that score. What they didn’t anticipate were the gale force winds. I did what I always do in those circumstances, I chose to run the devil’s elbow loop rather than around Caragh Lake. The loop is 5.5 – 5.6 miles, it’s 1.5 miles away from our house, so 3 loops and the there-and-back section make up more than 19.5 miles, and a detour on the way home would get me to a round 20. The loops include a big and steep climb, and to run this 3 times would be a good challenge. I managed the first loop without too many problems, but the wind got worse and worse, and during the second loop it became nearly unbearable. Right on top of the crest it came exactly from the side, and I had to lean into it, while trying not to trip over my own feet. At the same time the rain got blown straight into my side, and that hurt. It might be a sign of selective memory loss, but I decided those were the worst conditions I ever run in, apart from two hail showers (but those lasted only for a short time). The second loop took me about 49 minutes (nearly as slow as 9:00 pace) and I decided to reroute, as a third loop in ever worsening conditions did not seem particularly palatable. Instead I ran back home and added an out-and-back section to Ard-na-Sidhe into the mix. After 15 miles I really started to feel like crap, I felt totally out of energy and had to force myself on every step. I did time myself for those final 5 miles, and how I managed 8:10 pace I will never know. I practically had to crawl once I got home; I was utterly drained of energy and seriously doubted my ability to do another long run 24 hours later.

During the day it became obvious that I wasn’t ok, apart from a runny nose, stiff neck, headache and feeling cold (but no temperature) I had absolutely no appetite, when usually I’m ravenous after a long run. I did force myself to eat plenty of food, I felt I had to fill my batteries somehow. I know that the immune system tends to be suppressed after a long run, which might have caused the symptoms, but all the kids were complaining about various aches and pains throughout the day, so I guess it’s something that’s doing the rounds in our house at the moment. Niamh didn’t even want me to go to work on Friday, never mind running, but I promised I’d be sensible and see how I felt.

I was very tired, went to bed at 9:30 and was fast asleep by 10 o’clock. I slept like a baby until the alarm went off at 4:45, for the second morning in a row. I felt much better, and decided to head out. The conditions were much better than the previous day, no wind and no rain, but I decided not to run the Caragh Lake loop but to head for the devil’s elbow instead, because if I felt I had to bail out I would never be further than 4 miles away from home. I started slower than yesterday at 8:30 pace rather than 8:20, and just kept going steadily. The climb was a challenge each time, but to be honest it wasn’t too bad. I had expected to really hurt on the third ascend, but it was definitely manageable. Midway during the second loop the rain returned, but due to the low winds it was no comparison to Thursday’s conditions. All in all I was ok, considering how bad I had felt all of yesterday. It was quite slow, not that pace particularly matters on that kind of run. The last 3 miles were dragging a bit, and I was definitely glad for it to be over and done with.

I’m still not 100% ok, but I’m glad I did go out today. The way I figured, running when feeling crap and devoid of energy should be good ultra training, as long as you don’t do any additional damage to yourself. I kept checking my HR, and it was always quite low. Maybe it was stupid to run 20 miles like that, but given the same circumstances, I think I would do it again.

There is a great advantage in training under unfavorable conditions. It is better to train under bad conditions, for the difference is then a tremendous relief in a race.

Emil Zatopek

15 Feb: 19.5 miles, 2:44:43, 8:26 pace, avg. HR 147
16 Feb: 20 miles, 2:53:41, 8:41 pace, avg. HR 144

Note the Difference

Certain gadgets never fail to amaze me: my mp3 player magically came to live again. I love self-healing technology.

Tuesday saw a return of the hill workout that had me seriously hampered for 4 days last week. Apparently I'm not alone in the suffering. Mike commented how his calves had been almost comically sore after that workout (a long time ago), the main difference being that he returned for more punishment twice that week, while I chickened out of any further hill repeats up to now. I chose the same driveway again, but I'm pretty sure nobody saw me this time. I still want to get that issue resolved though - I don't run past any houses, but personally I would like to know if someone ran up and down my driveway four times in the early morning hours. Since I had to cut the workout short last week I gave myself 10 extra minutes, and proceeded to run up the hill four times, each repeat taking about 3:45 minutes. I tried to concentrate on various aspects, like lifting the knees, leaning slightly forward (otherwise I ran on the spot), lifting the knees, taking off and landing on the toes, lifting those damn knees ... the quads just about killed me, but I survived. I don't quite understand how the calves got so sore last weeks, because during the workout it's definitely the quads that are screaming for mercy. I was a bit stumped when I checked my average HR after the workout, a measly 142. That's 8 beats lower than last time, despite spending more time on the hill. True, I took it seriously easy on the warm up and cool down, but that low reading had me very surprised. I definitely worked as hard as 7 days ago.

I came home to a scene of moderate chaos. Cian had prepared his own breakfast, but decided to substitute the boring milk with the much more exciting sugar. Unfortunately the sugar bag had been nearly full. There was sugar on the table, sugar on the chair, sugar in his glass (up to the rim), sugar on the floor and plenty of sugar on the boy himself. He knew exactly how naughty he had been, and surveyed the scene with a very smug grin on his face.

It’s funny how sometimes things repeat themselves. Last week Lola woke me at 4am in the night after my hill workout. Back then I could hardly walk because my calves were so sore. Last night Lola woke me again at the same time, but this times my calves were nearly fine, there was just a little bit of tenderness. Unfortunately I didn’t manage to fall asleep again for the next 2 hours, and when I finally drifted off again I was soon woken again by the alarm.

Today’s workout was the confirmation that my calves were in much better shape than last week. The difference is like day and night. They did feel a bit stiff, but in comparison to last time it just doesn’t register. I tried to work at a decent clip, but found it tough going during the first few miles. At one point I felt like working hard, but when I checked the HR it was a measly 142. I guess I should be pleased, a low heart rate is a good sign as far as fitness is concerned. The second half of the run went a lot better than the first one, not only did I manage about 7:30 pace without even trying hard, I completely managed to Zen out again. The legs ran on their own and my mind was miles away. This went on until half a mile from home when a passing car got me out of my trance. I love it when I get into that zone. I happens all to rarely.

Niamh isn’t really one for Valentine’s Day. Instead of spending a romantic evening with her husband she’s off to the theatre with an equally unromantic friend, leaving me home alone to look after the unruly kids. If that entry has a disjointed read to it, that’s because it took me over 2 hours to write it with various children bouncing in and out of the room calling for my attention. It’s story time now, I’d better finish.

13 Feb: 7.5 miles (est.), 1:09. 4 hill repeats of 3:45 each, avg. HR 142
14 Feb: 8 miles, 1:01:23, 7:40 pace, avg. HR 146

Techological Breakdown

This must have been the busiest weekend in quite some time, between running, kids, household chores and a few “projects” I didn’t sit down for 2 days. I think normal people use their weekends to relax. What an alien concept.

The weather did interfere with my training over the weekend, but it also taught me a lesson that I won’t forget in a hurry. I awoke on Sunday to the sound of wind and rain, and it really did not sound particularly inviting. I did delay for an hour, and, lo and behold, it got better. The wind was still at or near gale force level, but the rain had eased, and on occasions it even stopped. I have learned in the past that tempo runs alongside Caragh Lake in those conditions are not really feasible, so I thought I’d do the smart thing and adapt to the conditions. A lot of wind means running the road to Ard-na-Sidhe to get some shelter from the trees, and since that road is a bit over a mile until the next big hill the choice of mile repeats seemed a very logical one. Now, as you might remember, I got a new watch for my birthday. With that incredibly advanced amazing piece of technology (ok, ok, a 30 Euro watch) I can finally time my splits. Stunning or what. I have done intervals in the past, but they were purely measure by time, i.e. 6 minutes hard/2 minutes easy, while running continuously on a road. That was fine, but it didn’t allow me to compare splits. I guess being new to that kind of workout should have told me that it was never going to be as easy as I thought it would be. I didn’t want to run foam-at-mouth, hands-on-knees anaerobic intervals, I was rather shooting at tempo run pace, with 2 minutes recovery; that way I would be able to do more that 3. After warming up I started off on the first mile, but got the effort wrong. Too fast. Despite that, it took longer than expected. The splits for the whole sequence were: 6:37, 6:40, 6:45, 6:51, 6:53, 6:45. Neither the times nor the fact that I got slower and slower (apart from the last one) are particularly glorious, and I wasn’t very satisfied, and I tried to come up with excuses. 1 - The distance might have been more than 1 mile (possibly, but it should be reasonably accurate). 2 - Saturday’s “recovery” run was too fast (probably, but Mike’s Mystery Coach seems to think that’s a good thing). 3 - I hadn’t recovered yet from the double header (who knows). 4 – From the third repeat on I tried to concentrate more on relaxed and controlled form than pace (true, but I still got slower and slower).

Whatever, you live and learn. Maybe I should have tried to run all repeats at about 6:45, but since I don’t do a series of 400s on a track it’s very difficult to gauge exactly how far I am into the effort. I might repeat the same workout next week just to have something to compare it to. On the other hand, if the conditions are better I’ll probably opt for a continuous tempo run.

Today was yet another recovery run, but unlike Saturday I tried to keep the pace down and not push myself. It was completely unremarkable until one mile before the end when my nearly new mp3 player gave up and died. One minute Marilyn Manson was sweetly wishing me sweet dreams, the next one all I got was static noise, and then nothing. I changed the battery, tried to connect it to the computer, but it looks like it has gone the way of the Dodo. It looks like I’ll rejoin the silent masses again. I don’t think I’ll have troubles adapting again, but in view of my forthcoming ultra I would have preferred some music in my ears for those long hours. It’s only 2 months old and still under guarantee, maybe I’ll get a replacement in time.

The weather has turned foul again. I hate it.

11 Feb: 10 miles, 1:15, avg. HR 157, 6 “mile“ repeats 6:37, 6:40, 6:45, 6:51, 6:53, 6:45
12 Feb: 10.5 miles, 1:27:50, 8:21 pace, avg. HR 144

Weekly mileage: 84 miles

The Long Run, Part II

No rest for the weary; the alarm went off at 4:45 and I had to get up. The biggest drawback of doing long run double headers during the week is the lack of sleep, I get just about 6 hours for two consecutive nights, and that’s not really enough for me. But at least the scenery outside the bedroom window looked inviting, and I got ready to go out. I was surprised to see water glistening all over the driveway; it must have been raining heavily all night. Looking up I could still see a very dark cloud completely blanking out one half of the sky. Luckily, the other half was entirely free and the stars put on a spectacular display, later to be joined by the moon once that big cloud had moved on. There were two slight worries on my mind, one that I might run out of energy at some stage due to Thursday’s run being a bit faster than planned, and secondly the pain in my left calf. As it happened, the first problem never materialised, and the calf did behave itself for most of the way. It only hurt on the downhill stretches, and even then it wasn’t particularly bad. I have run through worse pain. I did time myself after about 5 miles, and less than 41 minutes had passed, meaning I had averaged about 8:10 pace during that stretch. That’s good, I usually start slower. I got a nice surprise at one point. I had slightly lost track where I was and estimated I had covered about 12 miles when I saw some familiar landmarks ahead of me and realised that I was nearly on mile 14. Hurray. I felt tired when I passed our driveway after completing one loop after 17 miles, but continued on for another 3 miles to make up the full 20. The distance estimation might be slightly conservative, but it should be reasonably accurate.

I felt pretty good for the rest of the day, considering that I had covered about 37 miles in the last 2 days at roughly 8:00 pace average. But after sitting in the office chair for several hours, my calf started hurting again in the evening. That’s strange. How can a muscle take several hours of running without much notice, but start hurting after what should be several hours of rest?

Even so, that was the last I had felt of the pain. Today, Saturday, I am finally pain free again. I did go out for my 90 minutes recovery run, though as it turned out I ran at pretty much the same pace as I had done over the last few days. I should probably try to get some more variation into my legs; I covered the last 56 miles in the last 4 days all at nearly the same pace. The long-lasting soreness in my left calf has made up my mind about how many days of hill repeats I should do this week, it will remain at one. It took 4 days to get rid of the pain, and I don’t want to risk injury by bounding up the same hill again tomorrow. I’ll run the customary Sunday tempo run instead, and won’t bounce up the hill again until Tuesday. It means I won’t be getting a lot of hill running under my belt, but there is no point in forcing the issue. I should have started hill training earlier, now I have to adapt and get on with it.

9 Feb: 20 miles, 2:41:04, 8:03 pace, avg. HR 144
10 Feb: 11.5 miles, 1:32:59, 8:05 pace, avg. HR 150

Fallout

As soon as I woke on Wednesday I realised that I would be reminded of Tuesday’s hill session for some time to come. I had expected the quads to be sore, but they were absolutely fine. Instead my calves were in pretty bad shape. I wasn’t exactly looking forward to running on that pair of stumps, but Wednesday is the easiest day of my week, and I guess that helped. I ran alongside Caragh Lake, and when the watch said 30:30, I turned around. I usually run the second part a bit faster than the first and expected to be back home in exactly one hour, but must have accelerated a bit more than expected, because I was back in just over 59 minutes. The calves did behave somewhat while out running, but were rather sore for the rest of the day. Walking from one part of the office to the next one without anyone noticing my funny walk was a challenge.

I could only hope that I would feel better for today’s first part of my long run double header, but expected to actually feel worse. This was confirmed at 4 o’clock in the morning when I was woken by Cian’s crying. I limped to his bed, and he eventually calmed down (he’d had a nightmare), but refused to go back asleep in his bed because he was scared. I carried him into our bed, but it basically meant the end of my night’s sleep – it’s almost impossible to sleep beside that boy, he keep trashing about. What little sleep I got after that was finally brought to an end by the alarm clock at 5:10 am. The heavy rain that had fallen all night had thankfully stopped, but the gale force wind had not, and I resolved to cancel my initial plans to run around Caragh Lake and do two devil’s elbow loops instead, where there is some shelter on the part of the road that heads into the wind. I was just about to leave when the rain returned with a vengeance, and waited for about 3 minutes until the worst of that particular downpour was over. I correctly suspected that I would have to deal with similar conditions later out on the road though. Most of the country had snow today. Kerry had torrential rain.

The course did include the steep climb up to the devil’s elbow not just once but twice, and boy, was it hard work. I have run it so often in the last few weeks that I no longer think of it as particularly challenging, but today it was hard work, especially on the second loop. Cresting the hill has never felt so good, and I celebrated by running the second loop a good bit faster than the first (1:10 for the first, 1:07 for the second). Considering how bad my calves felt I was surprised by my pace, especially the sub-8 pace for the second loop. I’m not complaining, but I do hope that I won’t have to pay for my exuberance on tomorrow’s second part of the double header.

The calves, especially the left one, are still dealing with the fallout from Tuesday’s hill session. I was so sore at lunchtime that I wondered if it really is DOMS or some more serious signs of injury, but I’ve stopped being paranoid since. I guess I’ll know more by tomorrow. I expect to feel better in the morning; let’s wait and see.

7 Feb: 7.5 miles, 59:02, 7:52 pace, avg. HR 149
8 Feb: 17 miles, 2:17:26, 8:05 pace, avg. HR 151

Nutcase

I’ve jumped back into my normal training week, which meant 90 minutes on Monday morning. Somehow I had forgotten what it means to get up early each and every day, and when the alarm sounded at 6 am I was initially completely confused why I had set it (plus I had been watching the Super Bowl until the early hours of morning). Once my brain started working, I got ready to go out. I got slightly delayed, because when I opened the door I realised how cold it was (about –5C/23F) and went back once more to put on an extra layer underneath my long sleeved top. The workout went pretty well despite my legs feeling very heavy initially (I think I’ve typed that sentence many many times). Once I crested the devil’s elbow I managed to get a real good rhythm going and I was flying along the road for the next 4 or so miles, until I remembered to do a few strides. I did them, but it broke my rhythm and I didn’t manage to get that free-flowing feeling back. It was still a good workout. My work colleagues thought I was completely mad to go running in “that freezing cold”. (Clarification: -5C is as cold as it gets in Kerry, usually). Maybe I should have pointed them to some other blogs, but better not.

I know I’ve just said I jumped back into my normal training, but I made one fairly big change today, because I swapped the tempo run for a hill session. When I started this training cycle I played with the idea of a hill phase, but left the decision for a later date. I only just realised that I have less than 8 weeks to go, and somehow decided that a hill phase would do me good, primarily because it strengthens the quads, and apparently that’s particularly important for an ultra. It’s not as if I jumped straight into a hill workout; I have been running the steepest hills I could find as part of my normal runs for many weeks now. Anyway, this was my first ever go at some of the weirder kind of hill workouts, like “steep hill running” or “bounding”, excellently demonstrated in this video. I selected a hill about 2 miles away from home; it’s actually a driveway to a couple of houses on the flanks of the devil’s elbow. I think it’s a private road, though there are no signs. I figured nobody would see me anyway, so it doesn’t matter. When I started the first repeat of running up with strange high knee lift, I initially thought “this feels too easy” and stupidly switched to bounding for a bit. I learned my lesson pretty soon. Bounding is a killer. Pretty soon I switched back to “steep hill running”, but after 3 minutes I thought I couldn’t take any more of that, did a few easy steps, and turned around. I did a few strides at the bottom of the hill, and came back for more. I had learned my lesson and just did the goofy high knees bit, and managed to hold on for about 3:30, before going easy again. That’s when I noticed that the road flattens out a bit further on, which would make it a pretty perfect hill for that kind of training. On my third repeat I managed to run all the way to that area, which took just under 4 minutes. I came back for a 4th time, but turned around halfway through, because I was rather late and decided that I‘d better get home right now or else I’d be late for work.

So that’s it, my first hill session of that kind. This was more to test the waters and give me an introduction to that kind of thing. Now I have to decide what I’ll do next week. With long runs, tempo runs and hills, the week seems a bit too short now. I won’t cut back on my back-to-back long runs, and I can’t do 2 hill sessions as well as one tempo run in that same week, so either the second hill workout or the tempo run will have to be sacrificed. I’ve got one week to decide.

Niamh’s battling a cold at the moment; she started to feel unwell yesterday, and even worse today. She’s overloading on Vitamin C and Echinacea, and so far neither the kids nor me have caught it. Let’s keep the fingers crossed.

At lunchtime I started talking to her about my run this morning. “You know Dianne, who lives up that hill? Well, this morning I did a hill workout up their driveway. I didn’t think anyone would mind, and I didn’t think anyone would see me, but on one occasion a car came down that road, presumably driven by her husband. If you see her today, would you mind asking her if it’s ok to train there once or twice a week? If they’ll mind, I’ll find a different hill”. Niamh's grin got bigger and bigger as I kept on rambling, and by the end she was laughing out loud. “They’ll just think you’re a complete nutcase”. “That’s ok, as long as they let me train there”. She promised she’d ask. Dianne's daughter is one of Lola’s best friends at school, which might make things easier for me. Poor Lola might have to live with the fact that her dad is the village idiot, though.

5 Feb: 10.5 miles, 1:25:26, 8:08 pace, avg. HR 149
6 Feb: 7.5 miles (est.), 1:03, hill work, avg. HR 150

Now Look What You’ve Done!

I should not have listened to you. All that talk about flowers and chocolate, I should have ignored it and moved on. Instead I traipsed to the shop. The florist was closed, but I got a box of very nice Swiss chocolate. And what was the result? Niamh didn’t believe that I would buy expensive chocolate just to apologise for that little row in the car on Tuesday night. As much as I insisted that I hadn’t committed any other offences, she remained suspicious. Sigh. I blame you lot. Yes, you. (Just in case that kind of humour doesn’t translate over the Atlantic, yes, I am kidding. [Niamh’s still suspicious though].)

**********

I don’t know how it could happen so fast. I was only off the road for 4 days, but I’ve gained nearly 5 pounds in the meantime. If I ever give up running, I’ll turn into a walrus within half a year!

So, after four days off, I’ve started running again. The head wasn’t entirely healed, but I felt 98% recovered, the headache was gone, there was just a little bit of “something” at the back of my head, and I wanted to test the waters. Any sign of trouble and I would have returned immediately. As it was, I was fine. The doctor had insisted I wouldn’t run as far as 10k, so I figured 5 miles would be perfectly acceptable. I tried to run in a measured way, but after gathering dust for 4 days the legs refused to be reined in, as I knew they would. They say you don’t lose any fitness over 4 days. Well, let them say that, but I definitely started to breathe hard after 3 miles, and was quite happy to be home again after less than 40 minutes. It was enough to blow away the cobwebs.

Saturday turned out to be a really nice and warm day (spring in February???), and I spent several hours working in the garden. After that my lower back really hurt, and to top it all off, I was totally exhausted in the evening and fell asleep at 10 pm. I slept for nearly 11 hours.

I want to jump straight back into my normal training week, and Sunday is the day of my fast run, so once I managed to peel myself out of bed it was time to put on the fast shoes and start working hard. The legs didn’t feel very responsive though. I don’t know if it was the enforced pause, yesterday’s too-fast run, the hours in the garden or all of those things together, but I didn’t feel too good initially. But when I passed the first mile in about 7:11, I thought I might have a good workout after all. Initially I struggled to get the heart rate high enough into the tempo run zone, it continued to hover around the 162 mark. I tried pushing the effort on a few occasions, but fell back into the slower pace each time. Apart from one hill, the road is reasonably flat until about 3.75 miles, then there’s a climb until the 4.5 mile point, where I would turn around. I pushed it a bit too hard up that incline, the heart rate shot up all the way to 180 and my breathing had long gone haywire, but I recovered on the way down again, and after that it seemed to go better. I was quite pleased with the second part of the run. The first leg had taken me 30:27, the return was a little bit faster at 30:10, which gave me a total of 1:00:37. I’d have taken that before the workout started.

Nana and Gaga are here for a short visit from Dublin, and I used the trip to Killarney to collect them to go into the Nike shop to get a new pair of runners. I know Mike didn’t approve when I bought my previous pair of Nike 360s a few months ago, but I was really happy with them and resolved to buy a new pair to replace them. My preferred shoes are Asics Nimbus, but I like alternating shoes for each run, and my legs seem to respond best to alternating two different kinds of shoes. Wearing Nike one day and Asics the next seems to work perfectly well. As it turns out, they had a special offer, if you buy two (already heavily reduced) pairs you get the second one at half price, and I couldn’t resist. Even Niamh grudgingly admitted that it made sense, though she despairs at the fact that I've now got 6 pairs of runners again (2 for training, 1 for racing and tempo runs, 1 for football and now 2 new ones), only weeks after chucking out a whole lot of them. But hey, 140 Euros for 2 new pairs, that’s less than the rrp for one pair of 360s alone.

I’m playing with the idea of putting my present pair of Nimbus at the back of the cupboard and saving them for the ultra in April. They’ve got 160 miles on them and feel just about perfect now. If I preserve them for a few weeks and then use them for 2 or 3 long runs before the race, I should have the perfect pair of shoes for the race. Hmm, I might do just that.

3 Feb: 5 miles, 37:32, 7:30 pace, avg. HR 156
4 Feb: 9 miles, 1:00:37, 6:44 pace, avg. HR 165

Weekly mileage: 25 (ah well)

Catching Up

In the name of self-defence, I guess I should point out two things: Firstly, indoor soccer is generally played on wooded floors. It’s not the same kind of floor you may have in your living room; instead it’s softer and slightly bouncy to protect people who choose to go into silly tackles and end up landing head first. Secondly, Niamh doesn’t “have to put up” with my running. As evidence, your Honour, I wish to submit the following transcript of a discussion we had just yesterday:

N: When are you running again?
T: Not yet, maybe on Saturday if I feel better
N: You should go running again. You’re a much happier person on your running days.
T: You notice a difference?
N: Yes, and you were always cranky on Saturdays last year
T: You mean that last year, when I ran 6 days a week, the fact that I deliberately left Saturday free to be able to spend the whole day with the family, backfired?
N: It was nice idea, but yeah, it backfired.
T:
N: Mind, I’m glad you do your long runs at 5 am in the morning. That's nice of you.

There you have it. I didn’t invent any of that. Not only does she not have to suffer for my running, she actively asked me to go and run as soon as I can.

And now it’s confession time. Big time. Something happened back in September, and I never told anyone about it, but it’s been at the back of my mind ever since. I guess I’d better come clean, and now is the perfect opportunity. It was a post in Eric’s blog a few days ago about a runner suffering from tachycardia that reminded me about it again.

Back in September, I ran the Blarney Half Marathon. We made a family day out of it, but that’s a different story altogether. I made one tiny reference in my race report to the incident in question when I said “I didn’t do much of a warm-up, less than I had intended”. Well, there was a reason for that.

About 20 minutes before the race start I started jogging lightly in a field beside the race HQ. After 5 minutes of that I suddenly felt dizzy, my vision blurred, I saw black spots in front of my eyes and nearly fainted. I had to lie down there and then, just to avoid collapsing in a heap. I put my legs up to help the circulation. I already wore my HRM and had a look; it read over 200, and after a minute or two the display stopped. I felt my pulse and it was extremely fast but also irregular, like dub, dub, <pause> dub, dub, dub <even longer pause>, dub, dub, … you get the picture. This went on for, I guess, 5 minutes, and then I slowly started to feel better. Eventually I managed to get up again and since I thought that I couldn’t possibly run a race after that, I went towards the HQ to look for some medical help. I couldn’t see an ambulance, and was about to go inside to ask for a doctor when a loudspeaker came on, “all runners please go to the start line”. I don’t know why I felt compelled to follow that order, but I did. I kept thinking “I can’t possibly run, I’ll faint before the half-mile mark.” However, as I took my place in the field and waited for the five or ten minutes until the gun sounded, I felt ok. So, when the start came and everyone started moving, I moved along with them. Within 2 minutes I had completely forgotten about the problem, and 95 minutes later I had completed the up to then best race of my life.

I haven’t encountered anything like that since. It was really scary, especially when the heart stopped for a beat or two. I definitely felt it was the end of my running, and was afraid of having some defect in my cardiac system. But, I have been fine ever since, and my running has come on in leaps and bounds since then. I certainly don’t intend to give up running, and while I would like to find out what exactly had happened, I’m convinced that it was not a serious or even debilitating issue.

Having gotten that off my chest, let's come back to the present. I’m still off the wagon. The head is improving, instead of a splitting headache I’ve now got a manageable headache, and I might try a run tomorrow, but I will have to wait and see. I’m definitely itching to get back out on the road, but if I feel pain, or if I think that I’m not ready to resume running, I’ll wait longer. My plans for Connemara haven’t changed, in fact we’ve booked a room there for the whole family for the weekend in question. It’s only 8 weeks. Good God, it’s only 8 weeks!!!

1 Feb: 0 miles
2 Feb: 0 miles

Thump!

It was all going so well, training, work, life, everything was perfect. Too perfect. I was already waiting for the setback and hoped it wouldn’t be too severe.

I arrived on Monday evening. That’s my football night. I know, I know, some guy repeatedly warned me about football (soccer, that is) and marathon training being incompatible, but I did make sacrifices: I cut the football down from two nights a week to one night. Anyway, we were halfway through our game when I challenged for a ball. The other guy said afterwards he never saw me. I did see him, all right, but somehow it all turned out differently than anticipated. He came from one side, I from the other. He impacted me somewhere around my left shoulder. We were both running pretty much at full speed, and the force of the impact was enough to lift me straight off my feet. I did half a backflip and landed on the back of my head. Ouch. It was a wooden floor, and I felt it bouncing. My glasses flew off my head and shattered on impact (my spare glasses, thankfully). I was literally writhing in agony and the guys gathered around me, fearing a serious injury. Eventually I managed to sit up (with some help). I was dizzy, I had black spots in front of my eyes and a splitting headache. After a minute or two I even tried to continue playing on (in goal), but very soon had to pull out of it. I couldn’t even stand upright, never mind follow the game, and a second impact might have been serious. I was in no state to drive and got a lift home (from the same guy who I had collided with, no less). Niamh’s initial concern was for the broken glasses, until I told her what had happened.

I initially refused to go to the hospital. “They will let me wait for 4 hours in their hellhole of a waiting room, then talk to me for a bit and eventually tell me to get some rest”. Niamh didn’t relent. I went to work the next day (despite still suffering from headache), and she rang me about a dozen times. In my absence she phoned a nurse and then a doctor, and they advised her to get me to hospital. Eventually I relented and we drove to Tralee after work, not because I was worried, but to get her to shut up. “I bet you, they won’t give me an x-ray”. “Yes they will”. “No they won’t”. My initial prediction turned out to be nearly entirely accurate, with the one exception that I had to wait for 5 hours, not 4. After I said no to a dozen or so questions: Did you lose consciousness? Nausea? Headache getting worse? Dizzy? and so on he told me to get some rest. And he gave me some paracetamol. I did ask when I would be able to run again, and he said as soon as I felt ready. “But no stupidly long runs, like 10 kilometres”. I could have argued that 10k is not a long run by any stretch of the imagination, and that I could hardly remember the last time I ran less than 8 miles, but thought the better of it.

I have to confess that my main thought after leaving the hospital (at 1 am in the morning) was “65 Euros, 5 hours and a missed dinner, only to get the f***ing bitch to shut up”. I even started an argument in the car. Hmm. I blame the missed dinner. I tend to become an arsehole after going without food for 12 hours.

So, no running. Nada. Zilch. Null. Nichts. Just a few days ago Mike and Rob had argued for a cut-down week. I declined, but now I’m cutting down after all. 48 hours after the accident I’ve still got a bad headache. I won’t run a single step until I’ve gone a whole day without pain. I have no idea how long this will take, but definitely a few more days. Damn. It was all going so well!

30 Jan: 0 miles
31 Jan: 0 miles

Mileage for January: 333.4 miles. Yes, that’s a new record. By over 40 miles. Despite missing the last 2 days. Big Deal.

Mysterious Encounter

My birthday presents included various running-related items, amongst them a new stopwatch, which – wonder of technology – can display the seconds even if I’ve been out for more than an hour. Oh the progress. That should take care of Mike’s, Andrew’s and Phil’s concerns about my time keeping.

The weekend was mainly taken over by various birthday activities (usually instigated by the kids), but I did manage to sneak out Sunday morning for my main tempo run. As I’ve mentioned before, Sunday is the one day of the week where I seem to be able to get my legs going better than any other day. So it proved once more; I run by time, and the turnaround-point keeps being pushed out further and further. I’m always conscious of the second half and try to run even splits as much as possible, and usually I get it right. It went very well again, and I managed 9 miles in just under an hour. This keeps getting better and better. I even feel better during this run. Two weeks ago I was clearly hanging on towards the end, yesterday I was still going strong at the end, and yet another best-pace-ever tempo run was delivered.

I came home to a veritable feast, including fruit salad, birthday cake and blueberry-orange-muffins (I’m a lucky guy!), but had to promise to come swimming later that day. I usually try to wriggle out of that, because keeping tabs on 3 young kids in the swimming pool is hard work, I can never relax, and if I manage to actually swim more than 5 minutes out of the hour we’re in the pool then I’m doing well. Still, with all my fitness I expected to breeze through the water, but was surprised how much I was out of breath after each length. Apparently there’s more to swimming than aerobic fitness.
Anyway, the kids loved it, and I guess we’ll be doing it again soon enough (or even on a weekly basis).

Today called for another recovery effort, and as usual the legs felt completely dead early on, but had no choice but to wake up along the long climb up to the devil’s elbow. Most people wouldn’t run the steepest climb on a recovery day, but it seems to work very well for me. On the second, flat, part of the course I felt I managed a good pace despite the low heart rate. I was a bit surprised when I worked out the average pace towards the end of the run; I expected it to be faster. Not that it matters, these runs are supposed to be slower, and I certainly don’t want to overdo it. I had one strange encounter. I was running along the mountain road when all of a sudden I was surrounded from all sides by some very bright light. It looked like an alien encounter in one of those Hollywood films. For a second or two I was completely disorientated and had no clue what was going on, until I realised that a car was coming down the hill behind me and the light fog caused some strange lighting effects. Well, I never. It really had me spooked for a moment.

28 Jan: 9 miles, 59:59, 6:39 pace, avg. HR 165
29 Jan: 11 miles, 1:32, 8:21 pace, avg. HR 143

Weekly mileage: 83.5

It’s That Day of the Year again

I’m 37 today. We’re about to tuck into the cake, especially prepared by the master chef, Niamh. I love the party with the family, though the kids are more excited than I am. From a running perspective I do ask myself how long I can continue to improve. I’ve probably hit the age where most people start slowing down, but since I’ve only been running for three years or so I’m confident I’ve still got a few years to go until I hit my personal ceiling.

The promotion at work came as a bit of a surprise. In terms of priorities, work comes behind the family and running presently, and I sometimes felt last year that I wasn’t pulling my full weight. When you get up at 4:30 in the morning to run 20+ miles, your concentration does suffer after several hours in front of the computer. I was never worried about losing my job, but I didn’t think I was at my best there. My boss obviously seemed to disagree. Not that I’m complaining. Hell, we can really use the money. Maybe we can even start to afford the kind of life we’re living here.

Running. Yes. Friday was the second part of my sandwich, the first ever. The first thing that worried me was the early waking time. Thursday’s 5:20 am was still somewhat civilised, but there was nothing civilised about Friday’s 4:40. And to do so on consecutive days invariably meant a sleep deficit. However, as it turns out, I managed just fine. The other thing I was worried about was my right hamstring. It had started hurting over the last 5 miles on Thursday, and I could feel it again before going to bed. Miraculously, it seemed to heal overnight, I didn’t feel a thing wrong on Friday. The weather forecast had been pretty good so you can imagine my dismay when I opened the door to be greeted by rain. On the plus side, it meant a rise in temperature and I didn’t have to worry about the icy patches on the road. I started my long loop around Caragh Lake, counter-clockwise today for a change. I did time myself again after 3 miles, and 8:20 was a pretty good starting pace. I usually start slower than that. The legs felt better than expected, and it went easy enough until mile 8. At that point the road starts climbing, and the thought of 3 miles of continuous uphill can be pretty daunting. However, I managed just fine, and I did enjoy a bit of rest on the downward stretch. By mile 14 I had left the mountains behind me, and the rest of the journey was reasonably flat. I passed our driveway after about 17 miles, and was slightly tempted to leave it at that (as I knew I would be). I felt ok though, and went for a final short 3-mile out-and back section. The whole run went much much better than expected. I had expected to be begging for mercy over the last few miles, instead I felt pretty good all the way. I did time myself for the last 6 miles, and I hit about 7:40 pace, which is quite amazing considering the amount of running from the last few days. I was very pleased with that double header. Next week I’ll increase Thursday’s mileage to 17 miles and leave Friday at 20, and we’ll see how that goes.

What better way to celebrate your birthday than going out for a 90 minutes recovery run? The last few “recovery” runs had all been too fast at sub-8 pace, and I was determined to take it easier today. I still went for the hilly option, and halfway through my climb up the devil’s elbow I thought I should have chosen a flat course instead. But I think that hill was exactly what my legs needed to wake up again, and the turnover increased markedly once I reached the flat section again. I just about managed to avoid sub-8 pace, but to be honest I should have slowed down more. Not because I think it will injure me, but because I think too much effort on those runs might have a negative effect on tomorrow’s tempo run. Having said all that, running does feel nearly effortless at the moment, and since the pace is dropping without any increase in effort, I couldn’t be happier with the way things are going.

26 Jan: 20 miles, 2:06, 8:12 pace, avg. HR 143
27 Jan: 11.5 miles, 1:32, 8:00 pace, avg. HR 149

Title change? Ultra binning?

That devil Marc is trying to tempt me into dangerous territory. First he asked when I was going to change the title of my blog. Well, when I started this exercise I was a 4:06 marathoner who struggled to run the whole distance without succumbing to cramp. I think it's fair to say that I have improved quite a bit since then, but I've grown rather fond of the title. If it turns off a few snobs who don't read past the header, I couldn't care less.

Then he suggested binning the ultra in favour of a 3:0x marathon attempt. There are two major problems with that: firstly, I've told so many people that I'm going to run that ultra that I couldn't possibly change my plans without completely losing face. Secondly, if I tried to run such a time, I might find out that I'm not as fast as hoped for. Neither is particularly pleasant, and my plans are set in stone. There is still time for my next marathon once the ultra is out of the way. I haven't forgotten about marathons. In fact, just about every aspect of my training for this ultra (apart from the long run doubles maybe) is geared towards improving me as a marathon runner.

With that out of the way I can get to the last two training days. As promised by the meteorologists, the weather has been much nicer recently, with a clear sky and little wind. On the downside the temperature has dropped by some margin, this morning it was about -5C/23F, noticeable colder than before. Still, I definitely prefer this to what I've had to put up with the two or three months previously.

Wednesday was as close as I've come to a recovery day for quite some time, just 8 miles at easy pace. At least that was the plan. Despite choosing a rather hilly route for this, I ended up running a lot faster that intended, and came home with a sub-8 pace. I've said it before, sub-8 is not recovery pace for me. It felt easy enough though, and the heart rate wasn't outrageously high.

Today constituted the first part of my sandwich. I went for the Caragh Lake loop, 15.5 miles, and a fair few hills on the way. I averaged about 8:33 for the first 2.5 miles, then the hills started. The cold temperatures once more caused some very slippery icy patches and I had to be really careful in places. If I fell awkwardly somewhere on the mountain road and broke my leg at 6 am in the morning I might have to wait 2 hours in the freezing cold until someone could come to my rescue. Bringing a mobile phone to call for help is rather pointless, there's no coverage in that area. Hmm. Better not think about that. Anyway, the run went better and better as it went on. At around the half way point my hands started to get numb. I should have worn the warmer gloves, but I think it must have gotten a bit warmer over the next 30 minutes or so, because the numbness eventually disappeared. As usual I got faster the longer the run went on. I did time myself for the last 5 miles, and they went by in about 37:40, which is 7:32 pace. I'm definitely happy with that, but I hope I didn't overdo things. After all, I've got 20 miles ahead of me tomorrow.

Oh, and I got a promotion at work (together with a pay rise). You're now reading the blog of the software development team leader in our company. I'm happy with the new job, Niamh is happy with the new salary, and the kids are happy anyway. Life's good.

24 Jan: 8 miles, 1:03, 7:52, avg. HR 146, including 8x100 strides
25 Jan: 15.5 miles, 2:06, 8:07 pace, avg. HR 146

Sandwiching

Training continues to be good, my paces are still dropping, the achilles seems to improve and I'm feeling great. It's probably time something would knock me back a rung or two, but until then I'll continue to feel great.

Monday was a fairly unremarkable 11 mile run. Last week this was an extremely slow run, I still had Sunday's pace effort in the legs and needed a solid recovery effort. In comparison, yesterday was great, I managed some decent pace without straining and it still felt like a recovery run. The weather has improved by several magnitudes, there is no more rain and the wind is definitely manageable. The sky is clear, but that has also brought a drop in temperature, though compared to anything they have to put up in Canada, it's nothing, The temperatures in the morning are just below freezing, nothing I can't handle.

Actually, those temperatures did cause a problem today. There are several sections of the Caragh Lake road that are usually covered by a small trickle of water. Normally you hardly notice it, but today they were frozen solid, and the ice was extremely slippery (as well as hard to see). Twice I started slipping and sliding and very nearly fell, then I wised up a bit and brought the tempo down a notch whenever I encountered one of these patches. On a different day I probably would have been more careful to start with, but on my tempo days I usually try to focus on my pace and forget everything else.

I will make one change to my training starting this week. As Mike pointed out several weeks ago, ultra training usually involves running two long runs back-to-back, something apparently called a sandwich. Up to now I have been doing standard marathon training, but from this week I'll switch Wednesday and Thursday around, which will mean two 60-minute runs on Tuesday and Wednesday, followed by two long runs Thursday and Friday. As a side effect this will cut down the number of tempo efforts from three to two, because Wednesday's effort will be slow. I don't think it would be too clever to run two back-to-back tempo runs immediately followed by two back-to-back long runs. This week I'll keep my mileage at the same level as in the standard training plan, meaning 15 miles on Thursday and 20 miles on Friday, but I hope to gradually increase Thursday's mileage until I end up with two 20 milers back-to-back. I will see how that goes. I had initially planned on doing that sandwich last week, but decided to wait one more week because I wanted to get a solid 22-miler under my belt first. I expect Friday's long run to be tough, but that's the whole point of it, isn't it?

On a completely different note, Andrew had mentioned something he called parrot predictor a few weeks back. It's something I've heard several times before. Some people say your true marathon time is the fastest 26.2 miles you run in your normal training week. For a lot of runners this is an amazingly accurate predictor. Well, I calculated my times based on my recent training; two weeks ago the predictor came up with 3:08:55, and last week that dropped down to 3:05:05. Wow. Unfortunately, I don't think I would be able to run a 3:05 marathon at the moment. Why? Because I haven't done any long MP pace runs, and I think those are vital to develop your stamina to the level required to sustain your pace for the whole distance. Of course I'm not even training for a marathon at the moment, so it's a rather pointless exercise. I still like those figures though.

For the first time this winter the weather forecast is benign. The next few days are all supposed to be dry, if a bit cold (that's relatively speaking. Don't laugh there in Maine, Canada, Minnesota, North Dakota, ... and even Tucson). I might even have a few moonlit runs under the stars. That would be really nice.

22 Jan: 11 miles, 1:31, 8:16 pace, avg. HR 144
23 Jan: 8.5 miles, 59:11, 6:57 pace, avg. HR 157