Is it Now?

donothoponpop

Mon 6 miles easy

Hillbrook loop, chased by flies, dogs, and a herd of cows. And this is road running!

donothoponpop

Tue 14 miles hill recce

Recce'd leg 3 for Stone Cross to Lug relay, from Wicklow Gap to Camenbologue. It's about as dry as I've seen it up there, but its still a slop-fight of peat and muddy water. Visibility was way down (cloud) when I started, so I relied on map and compass to get me straight line to Conevalla. Very difficult to keep a running momentum going, and at one point I was stuck knee deep in mud for two minutes! Managed to free myself, and battled up the hill to the trig point- tough going in a lot of grass and heather.

Once I had reached the lunar landscape of the summit, the cloud had lifted so I studied possible routes. Do you lose height and go straight (meaning a lot of climbing), or do you stay high and go around (meaning a lot of distance)? The best route on the day will depend on weather conditions, how sloppy underfoot it is, and a large amount of luck. There are a few sheep trails to guide you, but they're very hard to find. After a lot of boggy climbing and fighting through heather, I reached the army sign which starts the path to the top. This bit is always quicker than I anticipate, probably because you can get some actual running done. From there I ran down towards the saddle, and studied possible routes. Again, on a wet and misty day, this section will be hell to get through; more peat hags.

For the return, I tried a few variant routes. Still not decided what the best way to run this is. My calves in particular were getting sore from all the heather climbing, so I ran over to Lough Firrib, stripped off, and went for a swim in one of the highest pools in Ireland. Absolute bliss, the water was refreshing without being cold, not a sinner about, and a smashing view of Tonelagee from the lake.

Jogged back to the car, drove home, passing a guy on a unicycle, going down the steep Wicklow Gap road. A suitable finale to a very surreal run.

donothoponpop

Wed 4 miles easy

Railway walk, easy pace, hot but nice breeze. Legs felt a lot better after, needed to stretch out yesterdays climbing.

donothoponpop

Thurs 8 miles steady 60 mins

Ran with SJ, PN, (and Izzy for a while!) along the railway walk. Its always good running in company, and the first few miles just slipped by with the chat. Picked it up a little on the last mile or so, but the majority of this was in easy pace.

ocnoc

donothoponpop wrote: »

Ran with SJ, PN, (and Izzy for a while!)

Keep us updated. Always important to see what old warriors like PN are doing... Last thing we want is to drop our guard and for him to pounce out of the shadows back at 90% of full fitness.

donothoponpop

Sat 5 miles steady

My brain was fried from cramming for a statistics exam, but a spin around the woods reminded me of why I run. Running up among the oak trees, all pressure sweats itself out, neurons return to familiar patterns, and information is silently processed.

5 miles steady, starting to feel a little lighter on my feet.

PositiveNegativ

ocnoc wrote: »

Keep us updated. Always important to see what old warriors like PN are doing... Last thing we want is to drop our guard and for him to pounce out of the shadows back at 90% of full fitness.

Game over lads.
AT changed shape after Mullaghcleevaun. Gave me a dose of the fear. Hasn't been right (or what has become right) since. Best to meter out the kilometres left slowwwwwwwly.

donothoponpop

PositiveNegativ wrote: »

Game over lads.
AT changed shape after Mullaghcleevaun. Gave me a dose of the fear. Hasn't been right (or what has become right) since. Best to meter out the kilometres left slowwwwwwwly.

Why am I having to repeat myself? Slower. flatter, running, for a while. Introduce some faster stuff barefoot on the grass. Seriously, there's a pattern here:
*little training
*very fast very steep very long uphill one day
*very fast very steep very long downhill as your reward
*feel your age and retire a few days later.

Leave any fast stuff that might exacerbate the ankle for grass, flat grass, for a while.

donothoponpop

Tue 7 miles steady (7:30 pace)

Day 1 of the 12 week P&D 55 mile marathon schedule. I last did this schedule in 2009, when I ran 3:10 and finished with a fair amount of life still left in the legs. Since then, any marathon training has piled on extra miles, and I've blown up during the race. So I'll revert to Old Faithful, and see if I can squeeze some life out for one last shot at breaking three.

I'm happy with my current level of fitness (I've been doing 40-50 miles weeks recently without issue). I'm carrying a fair amount of blubber, but thats ok at the moment, if anything its extra resistance training. Confident I'll shift it in good time for the race (will give up the superfluous wine calories 8 weeks out).

Decent run in the forest, managed to pick up the pace towards the end, finished strongly.

Pronator

Great news Paul. Another slave to the schedule, I instantly feel better that there is yet another poor soul that will be going through the same pain as myself over the next 3 months:D

donothoponpop

Pronator wrote: »

Great news Paul. Another slave to the schedule, I instantly feel better that there is yet another poor soul that will be going through the same pain as myself over the next 3 months:D

Yeah the marathon training cycle is about as structured as I get. I'm mainly just running for the social/health/landscape benefits, but once a year I knuckle down and hit a program. Hopefully we'll manage to get out together for a run once or twice in this cycle. I still remember that run we had with Mick, up Devil's Glen. Don't think there'll be much chance of us waiting for you to finish these days;):D

donothoponpop

wed 4 miles easy

Easy run through the rainy damp forest. That was the summer that was!

donothoponpop

Pronator wrote: »

Great news Paul. Another slave to the schedule, I instantly feel better that there is yet another poor soul that will be going through the same pain as myself over the next 3 months:D

Funny, I missed the part in my schedule where it said "WED: WIN A HILL RACE":D

Well done on the win Ian, you're in some form!

Pronator

donothoponpop wrote: »

Funny, I missed the part in my schedule where it said "WED: WIN A HILL RACE":D

Well done on the win Ian, you're in some form!

Cheers Paul - Thursday's are 2x4k so I figured I'd get that out of the way tonight. Great route and I am embarrassed to say that I live 5 miles from this route and I knew very little about it. Will form part of my longer runs in future;)

donothoponpop

Thurs 11 miles steady

No Garmin, no stopwatch, this was run on "feel", and it felt a bit tough. I felt like slowing to just take the sting out of the pace, but I'm happy now that I didn't, and finished it with a bit of a flourish too.

Can't decide if I want to do the P&D 12 week >55miles, or the >70miles. The first only has 32 miles for this week, the second 55, so there's a big difference between the two. I think my ideal schedule lies somewhere in the middle.

Slogger Jogger

Good run for a Thursday.

The decision then is obvious. Whichever plan has the wine intake which matches your weekly target. Simple.:D

Krusty_Clown

donothoponpop wrote: »

Thurs 11 miles steady

No Garmin, no stopwatch, this was run on "feel", and it felt a bit tough. I felt like slowing to just take the sting out of the pace, but I'm happy now that I didn't, and finished it with a bit of a flourish too.

Can't decide if I want to do the P&D 12 week >55miles, or the >70miles. The first only has 32 miles for this week, the second 55, so there's a big difference between the two. I think my ideal schedule lies somewhere in the middle.

That's what I did for my last outing; a compromise between the two schedules. Worked out pretty well. I took the 70mpw schedule, and chipped off a few miles from the top off each run.

donothoponpop

Slogger Jogger wrote: »

Good run for a Thursday.

The decision then is obvious. Whichever plan has the wine intake which matches your weekly target. Simple.:D

Just in case I ever run for President, let me say that I overstate my wine intake on this forum, to cover up a lack of personality

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

That's what I did for my last outing; a compromise between the two schedules. Worked out pretty well. I took the 70mpw schedule, and chipped off a few miles from the top off each run.

Yeah, think I'll do something similar. There's a huge gap between the effort needed from the two.
You and me should get together and publish a book, "P&G's <63mile Experienced-Beginners-Advanced Marathoning". Bestseller:D

donothoponpop

Sat 14.15 miles LSR 8:28 pace 2hrs

My knees were sore all day yesterday, so I skipped a run, and decided against a sloppy hill run with SJ this morning. Instead I tried a local Annagh hill trail route, figured I could truncate it should pain flare up. As it was, the only time I really felt any jolting was on the downhills, which I took easy enough. Knees feel ok now.

First couple of miles were handy enough, but when I turned into the trails, I gained the company of 1000 kamakazi flies for the next five miles, big buzzy bluebottles. Horrible! Felt good on the turn around (skirted Annagh hill on the lower trails), but kept the pace comfortable all the way home. This is the first long run of the program, the idea will be to up the milage, and lower the pace, over the next three months. Could have gone on further, but left it at 14 miles. I need something soft to compare with next week!

donothoponpop

Sun 4 miles recovery

Recovering from last nights book research, ow my poor head!:o

donothoponpop

Mon 8th Aug 4 laps of field barefoot

It was a planned rest day today, but I ran a few laps barefoot while with the kids. My knees get sore, so I'm going t introduce as much barefoot grass running as I can in this training cycle.

Tue 8 miles, including 4 at half-marathon pace.

Two mile warm up (8:15, 8:22), and then tear into these faster miles. The plan says to run them at current half marathon pace, which is probably 6:55 or so, but I like to push the hard sessions in the week as much as I can, so they were ran a bit faster.
6:34, 6:36, 6:40, 6:40.
I'm happy with how this went, the first test of the training schedule. Breathing wasn't great at first, and form needs to be worked on, but at this stage of the game I'm more than happy to hit those times in relative comfort.
Two mile warm down, easy pace.

donothoponpop

Wed 11 miles steady

My knee was giving me a bit of jip, I have a new pair of Adrenaline 8's in the post from the USA at the moment (thanks Ruu!), they can't get here soon enough. Otherwise this run was uneventful, my muscles were a bit stiff starting off, but soon eased into a comfortable pace, no watch, but circa 8 min/mile pace I'd say.

Off to Kerry tomorrow for a few days, I'm going to try the famous TFB Caragh Lake loop on Fri or Sat, maybe some of that sub 3 magic will rub off on me:)

donothoponpop

Weekend

Never got going in Kerry, family trumped every notion I had of long solo mountain loops. Instead I got to hike part of the circuit of Seefin, the views are just incredible, its a 12k mountain loop that will be done some day. Ran a couple of times along Inch beach, barefoot, with the missus. That was as much training/family balance as I could manage.

Tue 8.5 miles with 10x100m strides.

Knees still hurting. I went to Amphib King to try out new shoes, but a run on the gait monitor showed my Amphibian 11's are giving me more support, and less roll, than any other shoe. I bought a pair of Mizuno trail shoes, will give them a shot on my usual trails. I may just have to resign myself to losing weight. My current weight, and running fast downhills, is not a good recipe for healthy knees. So booze is gone until after Dublin. In truth, this has more to do with keeping mentally sharp for a heavy maths workload I have over the next couple of months, but it can only help the training.

Ran flat in Dublin, throwing in 100m strides every so often. Pace was decent, felt good and strong, knee jabbing at times.

donothoponpop

Wed 6 miles easy Hillbrook loop.

My old-time classic Brooks Adrenaline 8's arrived from the States (thanks Ruu!), I was itching to try them out. They're certainly heavier than the 11's, but that might be no bad thing. Cushioning on the forefoot seems better, lots of stabitity. It might have just been my mind looking for answers, but they certainly seemed better for the knees. Time will tell.

donothoponpop

Thurs 12 miles, including 8 @ 7:20 pace

Road running today, to test the shoes on the hard surfaces of Arklow town. Urban running is a novelty for me, so a run that might bore others was interesting and I didn't notice the time go by. Mind you, I did some of the run out along the sea towards the Rock, and then around the harbour, so there enough variety in the route too.

Knees felt good, the shoes feel more solid than anything I've worn in a while. A few minor hills and headwinds, and finished with a final mile on the cinder track. It's not in great shape, someone has "tidied" it up so there are swept mounds of dirt and leaves along the edges, meaning you have to run wide.

First 8 miles:
7:29, 7:33, 7:08, 7:36, 8:02, 7:23, 6:47, 6:44.

4 miles slow to warm down.

donothoponpop

Fri 4miles steady

Those shoes are the business. Already I have less knee pain when running, and a lot more power in the joint. I had to keep the pace down on this one, which was a scheduled easy run, and ditched the idea to run further after 4 miles, I would have kept going and maybe tired for the weekends LSR, which is the main focus (31k along the WW to Clonegal).

Its still early in the program, and I know enough to enjoy these relatively low-milage weeks, there'll be lots of drawing from the well as things get harder and longer.

Slogger Jogger

Are you resting tomorrow? I'm gonna do between 70 and 80 mins on the trails, mid-afternoon I reckon.

donothoponpop

Slogger Jogger wrote: »

Are you resting tomorrow? I'm gonna do between 70 and 80 mins on the trails, mid-afternoon I reckon.

I had considered leaving my car in Clonegal and biking back tomorrow. Might be the smart move, I'm not as hardcore as you! I'll let you know tomorrow.

donothoponpop

Sat 20 miles cycle

Couldn't fit my bike in my toy car (missus has the bigger one), so I didn't get to Clonegal, just did a spin on my local backroads, out to Tinahely, around the back of Kyle, and home again. Lashing rain, but it was good to get some low-impact training on the knee, which feels oddly silent and quiet right now. Like when a nagging toothache has been pulled.

Nearly 20 miles run planned for tomorrow am, from Crossbridge Tinahely at 10am, to Clonegal, along the WW. Pace, chattative, all welcome.

Slogger Jogger

lol. Visions of you trying to magic your bike into that car. See you at 9.30 in Clonegal so for the journey back to Crossbridge.