Lonely Boy

To be honest, I haven't got a lot to say, just too much time on my hand.

Niamh and the kids packed up and left for Dublin for 2 weeks, leaving me alone to look after the cat (at least I think that's what I'm supposed to be doing). As much as I'm going to miss them, this arrangement has 3 major benefits:

1. I can run when I want to
2. I can use the car for Saturday's trip to Waterford
3. I get to watch the World Cup in peace

The timing couldn't be better, then :)

Last week was an exceptionally easy one (I know, I've mentioned that before) with only 43 miles, the second lowest mileage of the year (the lowest was the week after Connemara). The legs sure took their time to recover but got a little bit faster every day. They are still not back to normal, but normal is a very relative term. It took a while for the mind to recover as well, it wasn't until the weekend that I actually felt like running a bit more than 5 miles at recovery pace.

My weight has been a bit strange, I kept adding on weight every day after Portumna until about Wednesday and then it gradually started to come down again, though I'm still up a bit. I'm used to seeing an additional 2 or 3 pounds for a few days after an ultra, it's mostly water retention where the fluid keeps seeping from damaged muscle fibres. After a few days that gets fixed and I spend a day visiting the toilet every few minutes. This time it wasn't like that at all, the weight kept creeping up gradually and is now disappearing just as slowly.

One more thing. I had the sad news that the 50-mile Dingle Ultra is going to be held for the last time this year, it will be replaced with a 39-miler in future, which somehow doesn't attract me at all - who wants to do a fun run if you're used to be doing the real thing! That's a real shame as the 50 miler could have become a real classic. Anyway, it would be great to see the race bow out on a high and if you want to do it (I know you do!), this is your last chance, so off you go and sign up. I just did.

20 Jun

5 miles, 40:42, 8:08 pace, HR 129

21 Jun

8 miles, 1:03:19, 7:54 pace, HR 136

22 Jun

10 miles, 1:17:55, 7:47 pace, HR 140

Weekly Mileage: 43

Weighty Matters

As I have mentioned on a couple of occasions, I'm presently trying to shed a few extra pounds. It's not that I'm particularly fat - my BMI is somewhere between 21 and 22, my body fat percentage close to 10% and my waist about 29.5 inches (much to Niamh's disgust). There doesn't seem to be much fat to lose, but I know from past experience that I race faster whenever I'm below 145 pounds. I started the New Year at about 152 pounds, and by cutting out chocolate and sugar (the occasional treat excepted) I'm right now losing about a pound per week, maybe a tad less, which is just about perfect and should get me to my desired weight in time. Things are all good on that front - certainly good enough to give myself a free pass for Pancake Tuesday tonight!

I can't complain fitness-wise either. Sunday's 20 mile long run passed by in no time at all, very much thanks to Sean for the company during the middle 10 miles. I did the same as for all other club runs, ran 5 miles on my own into town, joined the club for a comfortable 10 mile jog and then ran home again. The pace is a bit slower than what I would do on my own, but considering that I'm doing a couple of quality session per week that's probably a good thing anyway.

I must be in really good shape. I always used to notice the HR creeping up noticeably in the second half of a long run, something called heart rate drift (triathlon coach Joe Friel calls it decoupling). This is no longer the case, the HR remains steady even in the later stages of a 20 mile run, unless I up the pace. I had to be very patient in this training cycle and did a lot of aerobic running, waiting for a long time for improvements to show up. It has taken quite some time, but it seems to be paying off.

The cherry on top of the training cake is provided by speed work, which I tend to use sparingly, but right now I'm doing just that. I wanted to get a few faster miles into the legs (definitely with half an eye on Ballycotton, admittedly) and opted for quarter mile repeats. My 5k pace is about 5:45, which translates into 86 seconds, so that was the target rather than a balls-out effort that would leave me in a heap on the roadside. I used the first few to get myself into the proper rhythm and spooled them off one by one.  Quarter miles are mercifully short and I managed to recovery surprisingly well in the 60 seconds recovery breaks. I also got gradually faster as the session went on, which is definitely preferable to slowing down.

87, 87, 88, 84, 86, 86, 86, 85, 84, 82

More important than the pace is the fact that I managed to run in a reasonably relaxed and controlled manner. The breathing threatened to switch into hyperventilation on a few occasions, so I mostly focused on keeping that under control. Once more, I'm pretty happy with the workout. On the whole this is going well - I need to mind the legs though, they are definitely starting to feel heavy.

2 Mar

20 miles, 2:41:48, 8:04 pace, HR 134

3 Mar

10 miles, 1:18:59, 7:54 pace, HR 133

4 Mar

7.5 miles, 56:22, 7:31 pace, HR 150

   10 x quarters in 87, 87, 88, 84, 86, 86, 86, 85, 84, 82; 60 sec recovery

Weighty Matters

Not too long ago I read something in the papers that dark chocolate can help you lose weight. For the last few weeks I have selflessly conducted an experiment to test that theory and I'm afraid the results are unanimous, clear and conclusive. Maybe it was the testing protocol, but I can openly state that stuffing your face with chocolate night after night after night will not lead to weight loss, much to my dismay. On Friday morning the weighing scales reached 150 pounds for the first time in quite a long time, 7 pound heavier than I was before Connemara, and it's time to get serious again.

Niamh disputes the fact that I am a fat slob, pointing out that I needed a belt to hold up my trousers, but what does that woman know about fat and weight anyway. The weighing scales don't lie (and neither does a certain 4-year old). Niamh also disputes that the XL sized t-shirt she got me for Father's Day was a subtle hint.

My left quads have felt a bit weird ever since I came off Mount Brandon. The soreness of the first three days was just as expected, but even after that had subsided there was still one area of my left leg that just did not feel right. I have therefore been taking it easier than planned all week, only doing short and easy runs. On Friday I finally started tackling the problem with The Stick and the results have been very promising. I probably should have done that a couple of day earlier.

I got in a few faster miles on Saturday on my way to the group run meeting point. I started out at a very relaxed pace and gradually increased the effort until I averaged just under 7-minute miles. The group run itself was much more mellow, taking into account that there are a few beginners with us. They are doing very well, I just wished the numbers were a bit bigger. A lot of people seem to be put off by cloudy conditions, not realising that this is actually perfect running weather. Again, if you're in the area and want to start running, joining us on Saturday 9am at the A Fit Body Gym will be your best ever opportunity.

On Sunday morning I was back on the Kerry Way, trying to squeeze some more vertical gains into my training, in the hope that it will build up my leg strength. A double crossing of Windy Gap had left me totally knackered a few weeks ago; it's astounding how quickly the body can adapt, today I went over that same mountain pass 4 times for a total elevation gain of 3000 feet and managed just fine. I wish I could have done at least one more double-crossing, but I was already 20 minutes later than what I had promised Niamh would be the latest arrival time. Maybe the climbing wall in Dingle added a small extra training stimulus. It certainly felt like hard work. I can't believe how easy Shea makes it look.

With that run in the bag, I guess I am now officially tapering, even though last week very much felt like a taper anyway. The race is only 19 days away.

16 Jun

10.55 miles, 1:24:04, 7:58 pace, HR 140
   5 faster miles followed by a group run

17 Jun

14.75 miles, 2:19:18, 9:26 pace, HR 154

Weighty Matters

The last 2 years I successfully managed to drop quite a few pounds off my frame just before my spring goal race by staying off any sugary things during lent. This year, it was a complete disaster; despite following the same procedure through a torturous few weeks, I actually gained half a pound before Connemara. It's probably all down to starting from a lower base - despite that setback, I was lighter for Connemara than for any other goal race in several years.

You might have thought that since staying off sugar did not lower my weight, re-introducing it should not cause a weight change either. Not so. I must dig out that article I read a few weeks ago that mentioned that eating chocolate can help in losing weight. I'm dying to find out how they did it. Following my selfless scientific experiment of the last two weeks that consisted of sitting on the sofa stuffing my face with chocolate until it almost comes out of my ears, I can conclude that it is not a successful strategy for weight loss. No need to thank me.

Actually, having Easter one week after running almost 40 miles through the beautiful desolation that is Connemara is a brilliant way to ensure a completely guilt-free two-week gluttony session. Me and the Easter bunny have become best mates. Right now I'm 5 pounds heavier than 2 weeks ago and truth to be told I'm loving it. I just need to get back on track in time for my next race.

There is still a bit of a problem as far as my running is concerned. My subconscious pacer is completely locked into Connemara pace and I find it very hard to break out of it. I don't want to spend every moment of my run concentrating on slowing down. It would not work anyway. Instead, I'm working on the theory that low mileage keeps my legs in too fresh a state and am therefore in the process of cranking up the training again. When I say fresh legs, that's all relative, of course. I can still feel the effects of Connemara deep inside. That will take a good while longer to go away.

My resting heart rate of 50 bpm is still about 10 beats higher than before the race. I was surprised to still see it at that level yesterday, unchanged from the week before. The pace/HR ratio that I keep tracking after each run is still significantly lower than before Connemara, but at least that one is showing clear signs of improvement.

12 Apr

8 miles, 1:00:31, 7:33 pace, HR 153

13 Apr

8 miles, 58:55, 7:21 pace, HR 153

14 Apr

10 miles, 1:14:31, 7:27 pace, HR 153

15 Apr

12 miles, 1:30:36, 7:32 pace, HR 147

Racing Weight

At the start of last 2011, I weighed about 150 pounds (10 st 10, 68 kg). After years of figuring things out, I finally managed to gradually drop that to about 145 pounds (10 st 5, 66 kg) by the end of the year, without dieting or any other silly stuff. My reward was a year of fantastic progress with new PBs all over the shop; while improved training has much to do with this, carrying fewer pounds had an impact as well, I am in no doubt.

I was hoping this trend would continue, but not much luck yet. The arrival of lent came as a welcome excuse to partake in this quaint ritual again, even though I am not religious. For the third year in a row I am cutting out processed sugar from my diet, with the lack of chocolate being a particularly tough cross to bear (and the fact that I ended up creating some great desserts the other night for the rest of the family was a particularly cruel twist of fate). Anyway, cutting out sugar has worked spectacularly well the last 2 years with the weight dropping off my frame quickly and effortlessly, but so far all I have to show for it are sugar cravings, not weight loss. Maybe I am just impatient, one week is nothing in the great scheme of things, but when you’re having cravings and the end of the slog is not anywhere in sight, a little bit of progress would be nice.

By the way, I have read the book of the same name. I found it a good read but not too helpful; I guess my weight was already too low and my diet disciplined enough for generic suggestions to be of much use.

Anyway, running is much more fun than dieting. Donadea is still in the legs but last week’s easy mileage helped a lot and recovery is going well. While I never was sore, there was a certain “heavy legs” feeling. That pretty much went away on Tuesday; the first 2 miles of that run were the same, then all of a sudden I felt better with each step and was flying on the way home. Running was fun again.

I won’t kid myself and pretend to be fully recovered. 50 km take a bit longer to get out of the system, but I felt sufficiently encouraged to try some sort of workout on Tuesday. The plan was mellow enough, just 12 miles at 7:15 pace, and despite the breezy conditions it felt so easy that I inadvertently overshot the target and ran 7:10 pace instead. No problem, that’s close enough and the legs are perfectly fine. Maybe the nice mornings are helping, it’s a nice change from all the rain we seemingly had all winter.

And of course it’s Ballycotton on Sunday. Maybe it’s not the best preparation for Connemara, 4 weeks later, but I can’t miss it, it has become too much a fixture in my calendar – despite me saying I would not do it again after my first time there.

27 Feb

8 miles, 1:03:34, 7:57 pace, HR 132

28 Feb

8 miles, 1:02:42, 7:50 pace, HR 136

29 Feb

12 miles, 1:25:57, 7:10 pace, HR 147

Transition

You might not know that, but Niamh is as obsessed about baking as I am about running. She produces mountains of the stuff and it is all just ridiculously tasty. If I ever stop burning 10000 calories per week on the road I’ll turn into Jabba the Hut in no time whatsoever. Anyway, on Friday evening our (overworked) oven gave up and died. Niamh is still in shock and she keeps telling me it’s the equivalent of someone throwing out all my shoes. I don’t know how long it will take to get fixed, but probably not long enough to make a difference to my weight, which seems to be stuck at 150 pounds (10 stone 10, 68 kg).

I got up reasonably early on Saturday and after spending some time with Shea and Maia managed to sneak out for my long run. The fog was so thick you could have cut it with a knife, but climbing 500 feet on the first hill brought the reward on an absolutely magical scene. The valley to my left was completely hidden in fog, the sky was entirely clear with not a single cloud, just one lonely vapour trail. The Moon was hovering above the horizon, which itself was covered in pink, about 45 minutes before sunrise. Immensely beautiful and pretty much indescribable! It helped that climbing the hill already felt easier than last week, despite the fact that the hamstrings exhibited some leftover fatigue from yesterday’s run. The fog eventually lifted and I was running in glorious sunshine along the lake, until about 2 miles from home when I turned a corner and all of a sudden was right back in the thick fog.

Recovery consisted of 2 hours in the Kerry County Museum. I don’t think there are too many 9-year olds who beg to be brought to the museum, but Lola is one of them and the others did not complain, so that was our afternoon’s entertainment sorted.

I ended the week and base training with a short 8-mile run on Sunday that was supposed to be very easy, but I did raise an eyebrow when I got back and saw the 7:35 average pave on the Garmin. I never checked it during the run and thought I was doing about 8:00 pace. I’ll learn some day, I'm sure.

Maia has turned into an early riser all of a sudden, much to the disgust of her mother who does not particularly appreciate being woken at 6 o’clock in the morning. Preparing first breakfast and then a DVD for the miniature tyrant meant a shortened run for Daddy but thankfully a quiet Monday morning after all for Mummy. Hence the first run of the Transition Phase was nothing but a short, slow 7-mile run on the Caragh Lake Road. The first workout will be tomorrow; I still have to take it easy and gradually work my way up. The efforts will basically consist of short repetitions, usually involving a hill, done every 15 minutes during a medium distance run of 8-12 miles. I’ll let you know how it goes, of course.

22 Jan

18+ miles, 2:20:33, 7:48 pace, HR 146

23 Jan

8 miles, 1:00:43, 7:35 pace, HR 145

24 Jan

7 miles, 55:19, 7:54 pace, HR 139

Weekly Mileage: 74+

Weight

I know I have been mentioning my weight a couple of times. I assure you, this has nothing to do with body image concerns and everything to do with trying to improve my running times. I can’t even spot 5 pounds of difference in the mirror, not that I keep a close eye. A few weeks ago I purchased a book about this issue, Racing Weight by Matt Fitzgerald (the author of Brain Training for Runners), and found it very, very good. He gives loads of information about nutrition, clears up a lot of myths about carbs, proteins, fat and their ratios and has several good suggestions; if you want to implement them is entirely up to you.

One thing I did for a week or two was to keep a food diary. I had tried that once before, but this time really made an effort to keep it as accurate as possible. Apparently I take in about 2500 calories a day, and the ratios tend to be around 60 carbs/20 protein/20 fat, or maybe a bit more carbs. From what I gather from the book, this is perfectly fine.

The other suggestion I followed was purchasing a scale that displays your body fat percentage. I really had to swallow my pride for that one as I had always taken the piss out of these contraptions before. Actually, I would not have gotten one had the local German discount supermarket not offered one in a special deal the other week. Even if it’s useless, 20 Euro is no big loss. When I set up my details (age, height and activity level) I got a bit of a surprise. The highest activity level sounded appropriate from the manual (it even mentions intensive running), and my body fat percentage came out as 5%. I know with absolute certainty that this can’t be right. I tried again with the next lower activity level (up to 20 mins jogging, 3-4 times a week) and all other setting left the same, and the much more believable result was about 11%. This does not exactly give me a lot of confidence in the algorithm used, but will do as a baseline. As Matt Fitzgerald points out, consistency is more important than accuracy, because even if the results are out by a few percent you can still follow your ups and downs.

Anyway, the irony is that after reading all those clever things the one thing that made a change had nothing to do with anything from the book. You might remember that I have given up sugar for lent (which I’m still adhering to), and by now the weight loss is over 5 pounds, from over 150lbs/10st10/68kg to 145lbs/10st5/65.8kg, and amazingly this has been achieved despite never going hungry in the mean time. Just how much chocolate had I been eating? What helps is having plenty of fruit right at my desk as well as in the fruit bowl at home, and things like peanuts and almonds for grazing (another one of Matt’s tips). This really seems to work. If only I had known earlier. Niamh refused to step on the scales as she was worried I might have caught up, but this was eventually proven wrong. There is still a gap between us, much to her relief.

As far as running is concerned, there was a fair amount of discomfort in my quads, and it felt different to anything I’ve ever gotten before, so I guess it’s the cycling that’s responsible for that. Looking back at the race, I was quite disappointed to see my HR graph for the cycle leg where the HR was dropping steadily from over 170 at the beginning to 160 at the end, which is not what I would like it to look like. But I can’t be too critical about my racing performance seeing as I had gone into the race on exactly zero bike specific training, just falling back onto my basic running fitness and the commuting miles. It was always clear that there would be room for improvement, and only losing 2 places during the entire cycle leg was much better than expected anyway.

I have been taking it very easy running wise since then; the one workout that pleased me most were just over 60 minutes of swimming in the pool on Sunday, which shows that my swimming fitness is definitely improving, even if the swimming pace still seems painfully slow.

6 miles on a beautiful Sunday morning were followed by 8 very slow ones in the icy cold temperatures of early Monday, with 5 more today. The HR on Monday was very low and there was a big jump in that reading today, even though I do not feel any different. There are two possible explanations for this. Either today’s reading was wrong, or my body is fighting off the cold that had affected Niamh over the last two days. She felt really rotten on Sunday and Monday but is much better now. I’ve had a sore throat for the last 2 days and the girls both have runny noses, so there is definitely something doing the rounds in our household. With just over 4 weeks to go to Connemara, getting sick now would be a complete disaster.

7 Mar

am: 6.1 miles, 49:32, 8:07 pace, HR 134
pm: 60+ minutes swimming

8 Mar

8 miles, 1:08:24, 8:33 pace, HR 130

9 Mar

5 miles, 41:18, 8:16 pace, HR 141(?)

Anaerobically Overtrained?

It doesn’t come as a big surprise, but life can be challenging with a little baby in the house. After taking her time sleeping through the night, she has now started to wake far too often. And for some unknown reason, we seem to have settled on a parental pattern – during the day she’s Niamh’s baby, during the night she’s mine. A 4:29 am wake-up call on Monday was the low point so far, because even though Maia managed to fall back asleep afterwards, I did not. Last night was almost a relief in comparison, a 1 am nappy change was enough to send her (and myself) back to sleep until 6:13, and since my alarm had been set to 6:15, this didn’t cause any problem for once, especially since she fell back asleep after a bottle.

The original schedule for Monday had called for 11 miles, but with my recent rant about not recovering enough I cut that down to 9. I felt very good, actually, and the miles passed by very quickly. I t was probably a tad fast for an easy run, but the heart rate was pretty low, and I felt good, so why not take it.

Today was a different matter. It started badly and got worse, basically. After dealing with the aforementioned Maia problem, I got the shock of the day when my Garmin refused to come to life. And that on the day of mixed intervals, the one workout where I definitely need the damn thing! Dead as a dodo it seemed, but I remembered reading about other people having the same problem and booted up the computer. I found the solution, pressing the Mode and Lap/Reset keys together for a few seconds brought the device back to life. This is even mentioned in the manual, but for some reason only known to the technical writer it's not in the troubleshooting section but on page 6 where the function of each key is explained. Strangely enough the battery was half-empty despite being fully charged last night, but it had enough juice to last my workout.

Eventually, and of course a good bit later than planned, I made it out of the house, functioning Garmin on the wrist. Unfortunately the weather has turned again and it was really windy (the weather page lists wind speeds of 20-25mph, with gusts of up to 40 mph). I could have gone to Ard-na-Sidhe, but that road was so dark that I thought I’d probably run into a tree there and I opted for the road towards Killorglin instead. Initially the weather didn’t seem too bad, and 2 miles of HMP were no problem. As soon as the first recovery interval started I thought that this had not felt like HMP effort, and when I turned around and felt the full force of the wind against my face I knew why. To make things worse, the next 2 fast segments were not only against the wind but slightly uphill as well. The 2k at supposed 10k pace were as slow as 6:49, and then I completely lost focus during the mile at 5k pace, caught myself jogging along at 7:20 pace after my mind had started drifting, and did no better than a totally embarrassing 6:59! I even hesitate to put down those numbers because they are so bad. Half a mile at 3k pace (which should have been sub 6:00 pace, wind or no wind, especially since it was slightly downhill) brought a slight improvement but still only 6:17 pace.

I’ve had plenty of less than satisfying workouts during this build-up, and I have done plenty of moaning about it, but this one was by far the worst. I don’t feel the need to go on about it any further. I didn’t feel good today, but I also worked a lot less hard than I should have, no excuses. With less than 4 weeks to go I’m wondering if there is a point in trying to push myself faster than HMP pace if my subconscious self is seemingly unwilling to do so. Well, there’s one last race coming up on Sunday, and I’ll see how that goes. Somehow I’m always able to find a few extra seconds out of nothing if there is a bib on my shirt.

One more source of slight frustration is provided by my weight. I’m about 145 pounds at the moment, pretty much the same I was for my last marathon but 3 pounds heavier than a few weeks ago, and despite attempts to lose a few, the weight curve is actually pointing upwards. I’m definitely blaming Niamh for this. Imagine the scenario. You have eaten a healthy breakfast, a healthy lunch and a nice, decent dinner. Maybe you’re a tiny bit peckish, but nothing you can’t handle. Then this appears in front of you:



And the next day it’s tiramisu, followed by rice-cream the next day, and maybe some blackberry ice cream the day after. All of it homemade and all of it absolutely delicious. You could not resist either, don’t pretend otherwise. I’m definitely up against it here.

29 Sep

9 miles, 1:10:37, 7:51 pace, HR 140

30 Sep

8.5 miles, 1:03:48, 7:30 pace, HR 153
2m @ 6:41 (157/170), 2k @ 6:49 (167/175), 1m @ 6:59 (170/176), 0.5m @ 6:17 (169/174)

Monthly Mileage: 327