Stupidest training session ever done

ecoli

"We learn from our mistakes not our successes"

Talking with another runner last night regarding mistakes we made earlier on in our running careers got me thinking about this and how these mistakes helped us learn.

Effectively we aim to justify our training but I thought highlighting our own mistakes might help people from making the same pitfalls or even just shed light on training faux pas.

So what is the dumbest session you have ever done? (be it doing a session too hard, while injured etc)

For me it has to be 3x2k w/2.30 recover I did about 4 years back. To this day I have not come anywhere near these splits despite becoming a hell of alot faster across the board in that time. Looking back I was running alot of sessions wayyy to hard but figured that it would stand to me

average_runner

When i started off running, any day I ran, i would run flat out trying to beat the previous training session time.!! Saw it as a step backwards if i didn't beat it:eek:

BeepBeep67

Religiously sticking to my schedule when I should have gone to bed to nurse a chest infection.
Up at 4am to get a flight to the UK.
All day meetings.
Back to the hotel, quick change, followed by 9.2 miles on the treadie, which included 4 x 2.4k with 0.4k recovery.
Missed the next 2 days and then pig headed went and ran Dungarvan, where I duly fell to pieces after about 5 miles.

Next time I'm sick, I'm going to bed - I hope!

tunguska

average_runner wrote: »

When i started off running, any day I ran, i would run flat out trying to beat the previous training session time.!! Saw it as a step backwards if i didn't beat it:eek:

Yep I've done that one. Still find it hard to not get sucked into racing myself on recovery days though.
Most stupid session had to have been the day before my first marathon, getting a severe case of taper madness, going out on the rothar and do hill repeats up the mountains until I was fooked. Blew up at 22 miles in the marathon and all I could think was, you're a bleeding eejit.

Tom Joad

+1 on when starting out trying to set a PB every session.

dumbest though is a toss up between continuing to run through a chest infection because the Doctor said it was ok to keep running :rolleyes: or feeling guilty that I was a day behind on a training schedule so I done a tempo run 3 hours after playing a game of 5 a-side - missed a month off training after that one!

ThePiedPiper

Most ridiculous couple of days I put together were a 12 mile run all miles at MP on a Friday, followed by a 23 mile run with 5 miles MP on the Saturday. I'd had what I thought was just a bit of a head cold coming on, conveniently ignoring the possibility that it could be something worse. Ended up with a mild case of pneumonia that had me pretty much screwed for weeks.

rom

Running 6 miles at 7am the morning after a stag. Had to have a few pit stops.

average_runner

rom wrote: »

Running 6 miles at 7am the morning after a stag. Had to have a few pit stops.

Was that not a perfect hangover cure? Remember we were on session till about 4am and then did surfing at 10am, cured the hangover .

So went drinking after it!!

rom

average_runner wrote: »

Was that not a perfect hangover cure? Remember we were on session till about 4am and then did surfing at 10am, cured the hangover .

So went drinking after it!!

Well it was only that I had to a make like a dog in someones garden.

pa4

Just before I started running, hadn't run in years. About two days before new years eve I was lying on the couch, stuffed from drinking cans of coke and eating shít I got it into my head to run 8 miles. This was around 8pm and completely dark outside and I went out there and then. Ended up taking me over an hour and I was absolutely wrecked afterwards. Couldn't walk properly for days. This was around 6 months before I properly started running. Don't know how I managed 8 miles with zero training that night! Nobody believed me when I told them I had done it.

Another one is when I had a 4 mile tempo back around easter time. It was suppose to range between 5:50 and 6 minutes but I ended up doing it in 21:30 averaging 5:22 per mile (equaling my PB in the process.) Did this on grass on my own too to make it even harder. I had a niggle in my right leg at the time and this just made it worse and ended up having to take a few days off.

drquirky

Easy. 2 years ago. 20 miles @ MP. Laughable. Completely ruined my marathon as had me injured 7 weeks out from the race and wasn't able to get in any more LR's....I learned a good lesson from that.

skeleton_boy

Still relatively new to the game so many a silly session to come but doing every run flat out over the past two summers whenever I did run. Taking on the advise here to run easy has been a big reason I've become quite addicted to my running.

pconn062

Not so much a particular session but had a bit of a stupid week during the summer. Was my first time in a few years getting ready for the track season and I did two hard sessions during the week followed by running the 1500m at the Leinster championships at the weekend. Ran well in the race but ended up with a calf strain for all my trouble.

Gringo78

Take your pick from any over a 6 week period after I continued to run in denial of Achilles Tendonopathy. 8 weeks 6 days no running now....but hey, who's counting!

Chivito550

A couple of weeks ago having completed the dreaded 500-400-300 session, and followed up with a casual beer 800m, I thought, as the alcohol entered the brain, that some shot putt practice ahead of an upcoming decathlon would be a GREAT idea altogether. I enjoyed it a lot and rather than stopping after the recommended 7-8 throws, continued on to around 20, naively thinking I had one big throw left in the tank. End result, very sore right arm for 2 days and chest muscles sore every time I laughed.

Stupid or fun, whatever way you look at it.

FrClintPower

Gringo78 wrote: »

Take your pick from any over a 6 week period after I continued to run in denial of Achilles Tendonopathy. 8 weeks 6 days no running now....but hey, who's counting!

I feel your pain! Today is 7 weeks to the day since my last run with the same injury, I thought I'd caught it early, but not early enough. Rather than coming after a particularly silly session, it came at the end of 12 days of running in a row and probably something like 2 days off out of the previous 25/30 days. Not a problem in itself, but for someone who's only been running for a year, and who'd upped the mileage a fair bit over the summer, not taking any rest days was definitely silly.

Muppet Man

18 mile LSR and before i went running I ignored the "I need to take a no. 2" feeling. Came home from that run early, without any socks. Thankfully very very rural area.

Micilin Muc

Muppet Man wrote: »

18 mile LSR and before i went running I ignored the "I need to take a no. 2" feeling. Came home from that run early, without any socks. Thankfully very very rural area.

I should've thought of that!

Gavlor

Micilin Muc wrote: »

I should've thought of that!

Brand new white Nike sweat band was my cloth of choice

cjt156

socks

sweat band

Dock leaves; HTFU!

Joey Joe-Joe Jr

cjt156 wrote: »

Dock leaves; HTFU!

Pfft, nettle/briar cocktail; GTFO

BeepBeep67

cjt156 wrote: »

Dock leaves; HTFU!

thewolf_ie

Gavlor wrote: »

Brand new white Nike sweat band was my cloth of choice

Before toilet paper there was leaves!

Gavlor

thewolf_ie wrote: »

Before toilet paper there was leaves!

I would never leave without wiping

Micilin Muc

This thread is becoming a bit $hitty!

My stupidest training session was a whole training plan for a 10km, way before I took up running properly.

I hadn't run in months so the plan consisted of 3 weeks of running fast every day, upping the mileage by .5km every day, peaking at 9.5km the day before the race. Finished in 56 minutes!

Itziger

I did a really stupid thing the other day. 17 days out from the marathon I was planning a 15k run home from work. Just as I was starting off, I saw a bloke I know doing a bit of a track session. So what do I do but join in for a few laps. He was doing 400's and tagging another guy I know, who'd do the next lap and so on. (Must remember to tell them that static rest period is not a good idea). So I did something like a mile then a half mile at pace. This was after almost no warm up at all.

Then I did the 15k run home. Felt a bit of a pull in the calf half way through it and I thought, 'you bloody plonker'. Seems to have been a false alarm thankfully.

hypersonic

I remember running down a mountain with little voice saying slow down you'll break something, my reply was let it be something small, 500m later I ended up with a six stitch scare, I should have listened

CR 7

Just back from mine, I believe. Managed to make a wrong turn in the very dense fog during a run through forestry. Too embarrassed to check the mileage yet, but it was upwards of 20 miles anyway. It was meant to be a 10/11 mile long slow run to try and sort out some niggly injuries. Probably won't be in any state to run for a few days/weeks, as my longest run so far was a half marathon. Calves/hamstrings rather tender now.

:o:o