A Slow Journey to Faster Times

yaboya1

Sunday 9th March - 5m Recovery
5.4m @ 9:29p/m average

I wish I had done this before work rather than afterwards, as this morning's beautiful weather had taken quite a turn for the worse by the time I got home. Really didn't fancy heading out in it, but convinced myself I wouldn't regret it and hit the road around 7:30pm. I spent almost an hour getting completely saturated by the constant hazy rain, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and feel much better now than I did earlier on with any stiffness/soreness from yesterday totally gone. Not sure how the next week will go as my training is sure to be affected by the Cheltenham Festival, so I'll fit runs in where I can before getting back to normal next Saturday.


Splits:

Mile 1 - 9:11
Mile 2 - 9:36
Mile 3 - 9:23
Mile 4 - 9:34
Mile 5 - 9:40
0.4 - 3:51

FBOT01

yaboya1 wrote: »

Not sure how the next week will go as my training is sure to be affected by the Cheltenham Festival, so I'll fit runs in where I can......

Feel free to share your investment advice for the week;)

yaboya1

FBOT01 wrote: »

Feel free to share your investment advice for the week;)

I've no problem doing that once I'm not liable for any losses incurred

Be warned though, my race previews are almost as long as my race reports!!

FBOT01

yaboya1 wrote: »

I've no problem doing that once I'm not liable for any losses incurred

Be warned though, my race previews are almost as long as my race reports!!

You have wet my appetite now. I will top up the betfair account and await your post.

Gavlor

yaboya1 wrote: »

I've no problem doing that once I'm not liable for any losses incurred

Be warned though, my race previews are almost as long as my race reports!!

A certain red and white branded booking office are offering money back special on champion hurdle if the fly finishes 1st or 2nd. The way betting is going it might be worth a free bet on jezki @ 10's....I see the new one has gone into fav?

yaboya1

Gavlor wrote: »

A certain red and white branded booking office are offering money back special on champion hurdle if the fly finishes 1st or 2nd. The way betting is going it might be worth a free bet on jezki @ 10's....I see the new one has gone into fav?

Yeah, it's definitely worth shopping around during the week. PP are giving you money back in the Supreme (opening race) if your horse finishes 2nd, 3rd or 4th. They'll be all trying to get our business, so keep an eye out for the special offers. As I've just mentioned to FBOT, my thoughts are on my Facebook page 'Enhanceyourchances - Betting advice for shrewd punters' for anyone who's interested in reading them?

yaboya1

Tuesday 11th March - 12m Easy
12.6m @ 10:07p/m average

I got up early to watch The Morning Line and decided to kill some time between that and the start of the racing by running for two hours. Tried my best to keep the heart rate at around 135bpm (almost succeeded at 136). It was difficult at times because I had to go so slowly, but it was enjoyable nonetheless on such a lovely morning. I'm hoping to run tomorrow and Thursday too as Friday will be a complete write off in the pub


Splits:

Mile 1 - 9:31
Mile 2 - 10:29
Mile 3 - 10:41
Mile 4 - 10:17
Mile 5 - 9:44
Mile 6 - 9:56
Mile 7 - 10:10
Mile 8 - 9:50
Mile 9 - 9:49
Mile 10 - 9:53
Mile 11 - 9:14
Mile 12 - 9:36
0.6 - 6:22

Gavlor

Gavlor wrote: »

A certain red and white branded booking office are offering money back special on champion hurdle if the fly finishes 1st or 2nd. The way betting is going it might be worth a free bet on jezki @ 10's....I see the new one has gone into fav?

BOOM!!

yaboya1

Wednesday 12th March - 75 minutes Steady
9.13m @ 8:13p/m average

I was expecting the pace to be around the 7:40min/mile mark, as that's about what it was at this heart rate in the HADD test last week. Surprisingly it was about 20 seconds slower than that. Maybe that was to do with the sun, as there's definitely some heat in it today. I won't complain though, as it was a beautiful morning to be out there. I ignored the first two miles as the HR was jumping all over the place as usual, but I kept it very close to the intended target of 150bpm (avg 152bpm) after that. I could get used to training in weather like that.


Splits:

Mile 1 - 8:55
Mile 2 - 8:29
Mile 3 - 7:51
Mile 4 - 8:01
Mile 5 - 7:55
Mile 6 - 8:07
Mile 7 - 8:06
Mile 8 - 8:10
Mile 9 - 8:19
0.13 - 1:08

outforarun

Just speed read your log. There are so many good logs out there at moment it's hard to keep up with most, let alone discover new ones. Congratulations on the spectacular progress you're experiencing. Those original 10M and HM targets are so super soft now. Absolutely loved your Seville report, especially the deliberate decision to soak up all the atmosphere and snapshot the moment at the finishing line. Great stuff.

yaboya1

outforarun wrote: »

Just speed read your log. There are so many good logs out there at moment it's hard to keep up with most, let alone discover new ones. Congratulations on the spectacular progress you're experiencing. Those original 10M and HM targets are so super soft now. Absolutely loved your Seville report, especially the deliberate decision to soak up all the atmosphere and snapshot the moment at the finishing line. Great stuff.

Thanks. Just had a skim through your log there too.
Are you still targeting 3:19 in Cork?
Everything looks to be going to plan.

outforarun

yaboya1 wrote: »

Thanks. Just had a skim through your log there too.
Are you still targeting 3:19 in Cork?
Everything looks to be going to plan.

Yeah still targeting 3:19. And yeah so far I'm hitting all the right notes at least in terms of the training plan. I need to work on confidence though and try put previous marathons out of my head, and try remove the expectation that I'll blow-up (5 marathons, 5 blow-ups of varying severity). I'm trusting that this year's revised paces together with a 1700+ mile base from 2013 will make the difference.

yaboya1

Thursday 13th March - 60 minutes Easy
6.22m @ 9:39p/m average (135bpm avg)

Managed to get another hour of running in this morning. The pace was noticeably quicker than Tuesday, despite a relatively similar heart rate. I assume this is down to the colder temperature today.


Splits:

Mile 1 - 9:46
Mile 2 - 9:22
Mile 3 - 9:52
Mile 4 - 9:40
Mile 5 - 9:19
Mile 6 - 10:03
0.22 - 2:02

yaboya1

My Cheltenham Gold Cup day shenanigans ruined any training aspirations I had for this weekend. I gave myself a rest day on Friday, but was too tired from the aftermath to go out after work yesterday or before work this morning. I'm going to do some stretching, foam rolling and core work when I get home tonight and I've put together a schedule for the following week which I hope will help me hit my HM target of 1:24:xx in Larne next Saturday.

Would be interested to know what people think:

Monday: AM: 90mins Easy PM: 60mins Easy (with 6 x 100m Strides)
Tuesday: 8m (with 5 x 600m @ VO2 Max)
Wednesday: 45mins easy
Thursday: Rest
Friday: 4m Recovery
Saturday: Larne Half-Marathon

AuldManKing

What you have outlined seems fine.

Here's an alternative as well.
http://running.competitor.com/2013/09/training/workout-of-the-week-race-week-workouts_20718

ecoli

Overall layout of the week looks fine though personally I would tend to veer away from Vo2 max stuff. All you want to be doing this week is allowing your body to freshen up while keeping in touch with race pace. AMK's alternative looks decent or even 5x800m @ 10k - HMP off 90s would be fit also.

yaboya1

ecoli wrote: »

Overall layout of the week looks fine though personally I would tend to veer away from Vo2 max stuff. All you want to be doing this week is allowing your body to freshen up while keeping in touch with race pace. AMK's alternative looks decent or even 5x800m @ 10k - HMP off 90s would be fit also.

I was just thinking about knocking the VO2 Max stuff on the head myself while I was out on my run this evening, then I came in to read this.
Great minds eh.....? :P
The main reason I had that in there was because I've been going mad with paranoia that I've lost some fitness after a rough weekend and I thought a solid set of 600's would convince me otherwise. Stupid I know, especially coming off my 5k run last week but I've got my confidence back after doing some strides tonight. As I was finishing up I was thinking a VO2 Max workout in the morning might burn me out, so I'll probably go with AMK's suggestion, as a similar plan seemed to work well for skeleton_boy last week.

Cheers for the advice though (and well done on the the top pacing job in Tralee)

yaboya1

Monday 17th March - (A.M.) 90 minutes Easy
11m @ 8:48p/m average (137bpm)

First run since Thursday morning. Had a long day on the beer last Friday which I haven't had a chance to fully get over, as I've been in work every day since. Feeling very tired, so getting up at the crack of dawn for this wasn't easy. Much better when I got out there though. Glad I made the effort. Was supposed to be 90 minutes of easy running, but I added an extra six minutes to get in the eleventh mile.


Splits:

Mile 1 - 8:58
Mile 2 - 8:35
Mile 3 - 8:50
Mile 4 - 8:45
Mile 5 - 8:32
Mile 6 - 8:37
Mile 7 - 8:44
Mile 8 - 9:01
Mile 9 - 8:53
Mile 10 - 9:04
Mile 11 - 8:46


Monday 17th March - (P.M.) 60 minutes Easy (with 6 x 100m strides)
7.03m @ 8:34p/m average (135bpm)
(Strides: 17:94, 16:56, 18:01, 18:21, 18:28, 17:84)

Didn't fancy this after the early start and a long day in work today, but went out as soon as I got in the door before I had the chance to change my mind. Really felt great during the run though and managed an improvement on the pace per mile from this morning, despite a slightly slower heart rate. Considering I didn't feel I was putting in maximum effort with the strides, I was really pleased when I saw the splits for those. Really looking forward to the race on Saturday now.


Mile 1 - 9:00
Mile 2 - 8:43
Mile 3 - 8:37
Mile 4 - 8:17
Mile 5 - 8:17
Mile 6 - 8:33
Mile 7 - 8:29

AuldManKing

I believe you have some questions to answer.............best of luck this week, good fun!

yaboya1

Tuesday 18th March

I decided to follow the suggestion for today's workout from the link that AMK posted. This was:

1-mile warmup, 2-3 miles @ goal half marathon race pace, 1 mile easy, 5 x 1:00 “on”/1:00 “off” @ 10K race pace, 1-mile cooldown

I'm hoping to go sub 1:25 on Saturday, so that meant I needed to be below 6:30min/mile for the HMP miles, while my recent 10k time of 39:07 gave me a target of 6:16min/mile for the one minute segments.

Everything went pretty much according to plan leaving me much happier than I was yesterday morning, when I had convinced myself that my fitness levels had dropped due to an over-indulgent Gold Cup day. The last mile of the HMP miles was very tough into the wind so I was delighted to hold the pace there, but I think I over compensated on the first one minute segment by pushing too hard when I got a bit of shelter. I eased off immediately for the next four when I realised though.

1m wu - 8:01
HMP 1 - 6:25
HMP 2 - 6:22
HMP 3 - 6:25
1m cd- 9:10


5 x 1min @ 10k pace

1 - 5:48
2 - 6:16
3 - 6:07
4 - 6:16
5 - 6:18

yaboya1

Wednesday 19th March - 45 minutes Easy
4.58m @ 9:50p/m average

Just an easy run to loosen up the legs after yesterday's workout. Went as slow as I possibly could, despite the fact that the HRM said my average was 162bpm. This was definitely incorrect as I don't even think I broke sweat. I'll have to make sure I moisten the HRM before I head out next time.


Splits:

Mile 1 - 9:45
Mile 2 - 9:42
Mile 3 - 9:52
Mile 4 - 9:54
0.58 - 5:49

yaboya1

Thursday 20th March - Rest

Today was supposed to be a complete day of rest, but I woke up early feeling fresh and decided to get another cycle of stretching, foam rolling and core work in. Seems to have loosened me out and any stiffness from the past couple of days has vanished. Can't wait for Saturday now!

belcarra

Best of luck on Saturday P!

Gold, Silver & Bronze targets??
What's the course profile like?

yaboya1

belcarra wrote: »

Best of luck on Saturday P!

Gold, Silver & Bronze targets??
What's the course profile like?

Thanks John.
Let's go with the following:

Gold: Sub 1:25 (Hopeful/confident I can achieve this)
Silver: Sub 1:26:20 (I ran this is training for Seville)
Bronze: Sub 1:30 (original 2014 goal)

This is TRR's take on it: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/27529179

I've ran it once. Nice scenic course. I remember it as being a little hilly in parts. Definitely not a PB course in my opinion. I would have expected to run 2 minutes quicker than I actually did. Wind can be also an issue as it's along the cost.

belcarra

yaboya1 wrote: »

Thanks John.
Let's go with the following:

Gold: Sub 1:25 (Hopeful/confident I can achieve this)
Silver: Sub 1:26:20 (I ran this is training for Seville)
Bronze: Sub 1:30 (original 2014 goal)

This is TRR's take on it: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/27529179

I've ran it once. Nice scenic course. I remember it as being a little hilly in parts. Definitely not a PB course in my opinion. I would have expected to run 2 minutes quicker than I actually did. Wind can be also an issue as it's along the cost.

Looks like mile 7 & 8 are the ones to watch out for!
I'd say you'll be in with a serious chance of Gold if the conditions are compliant.

yaboya1

belcarra wrote: »

Looks like mile 7 & 8 are the ones to watch out for!
I'd say you'll be in with a serious chance of Gold if the conditions are compliant.

Let's hope so
I'll play it by ear. If anything goes wrong I'll be blaming the weather because I have no excuses fitness wise!

yaboya1

Friday 21st March - 4m Recovery (with 6 x 100m strides)
4m @ 9:03p/m average (116bpm)
(Strides: 19:06, 20:32, 20:35, 18:73, 17:67, 17:53)

A beautiful day outside, so took this very easily to spend as long out there as I could. Threw some strides in at the end to get the legs turning over, but wasn't making maximum effort. I'll keep that for tomorrow

Mile 1 - 9:15
Mile 2 - 9:00
Mile 3 - 8:52
Mile 4 - 9:08

Ferris B

good luck tomorrow.

I've set aside a few hours over the weekend to read the race report. Just trying to decide what beer to accompany the report reading.:)

FBOT01

Ferris B wrote: »

good luck tomorrow.

I've set aside a few hours over the weekend to read the race report. Just trying to decide what beer to accompany the report reading.:)

+1.......Ferris, are you buying???:rolleyes:

yaboya1

Ferris B wrote: »

good luck tomorrow.

I've set aside a few hours over the weekend to read the race report. Just trying to decide what beer to accompany the report reading.:)

I've only myself to blame for your expectations