Tuesday, March 03, 2009

Back Home

I guess I’m a creature of habit, which is why I don’t even think about getting up early each day any more; I just do it. Being back home in Caragh Lake provided me with my usual roads, which I found comforting. It struck me on Monday that for the last 5 days I had run in different areas of the country each day: Thursday Cork, Friday Kerry, Saturday Cork, Sunday Dublin, Monday Kerry. I don’t particularly want to repeat the insane amount of travel that happened between each of these runs ever again.

With the Ballycotton 10 miler being on Sunday, I did hesitate on the mileage for Monday’s long run. The original plan had said 20 and the revised one 18, but the last thing I did on Sunday evening was to set the alarm for 4:50, time for 20 miles. Things got a bit more complicated when Maia woke as I got ready and I had to spend some time preparing a bottle and settling her back in her cot; I thought I probably wouldn’t have time for 20 miles and would end up doing 18 or 19 after all.

Since I had turned Saturday’s planned easy run into a tempo workout I couldn’t help but wonder how my legs would hold up.

I set off into the very dark night. In marked contrast to all the runs in Cork it was dead still; I did not encounter another human being for the next 2 hours. The weather wasn’t great with plenty of wind and the occasional rain shower, which is never a good combination. But the legs held up much better than they did the previous Monday, and when I reached our driveway after 15 miles I decided to go for the entire 20 miles and to put some extra effort into the final 5. I started that last section at around 7:30 pace but surprisingly managed to gradually increase it until I ended up with an average pace of 7:22 for the last 5 miles, 7:47 pace for the entire run. That’s a decent improvement to last week, but definitely not yet where I want to be.

Cycling to and from work was a chore, with the tired legs and the increasingly strong wind. At times like that I really want to buy a new car, but the journey is over after 20 minutes and then I’m happy enough with my bike again.

I took it really easy today, my first easy run in a few days, and something I really needed. For once I didn’t have to keep an eye on the Garmin to ensure that I wouldn’t speed up unnecessarily, the legs dictated the pace and the rest followed. I should have worn long sleeves though; the temperature of 3C/37 F would have warranted that, especially as the wind was definitely picking up again. One day I’ll learn.

I still haven’t quite decided yet how much I am prepared to compromise the marathon training for Sunday’s race. I’ll definitely do a time trial tomorrow; the question remains how long I should run on Friday. On a normal week this would be 18 miles. I’ll definitely cut this to 15 at most, but I’m thinking about doing no more than 10 or 12. Decisions, decisions.
2 Mar
20 miles, 2:35:34, 7:47 pace, HR 152
last 5 @ 7:22 pace
3 Mar
8 miles, 1:06:56, 8:22 pace, HR 140

2 comments:

  1. It depends on how fresh you want to feel. Cutting Friday to 10 probably won't make much difference to your race time on Sunday - 30-45 seconds maybe.

    I remember a mate of mine switched his 20 miler to Wednesday morning because he had family duties on the weekend, and raced his second best 5k time on Friday night.

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  2. IF YOU WANT TO KEEP THE MILEAGE UP YOU COULD DO A FIVE MILE WARM UP BEFORE THE RACE FOLLOWED BY 5 WARM DOWN,IF YOU ENTER THE RACE WITH A 20 AND 18 IN THE LEGS YOU MIGHT BE LEFT WONDERING 'WHAT IF,MIGHT I HAVE RUN ON FRESHER LEGS'. IT DEPENDS ON HOW IMPORTANT THE 10 MILE RACE IS TO YOU [ a good time will do wonders for the self confidence].
    I have my own dilemma, i have a 20 mile race next week, should i run it flat out, and lose a weeks marathon training after it, or run it at my hoped for marathon pace and maybe try to run the last 5 miles faster!

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