To Connemara and Beyond ...

Firedance

Wow, brilliant nop! And a superbly written report. Congrats on the pb

Myles Splitz

Congrats on the PB sounds like the marathon strength has helped. Keep it up

annapr

Well done Nop! Sounds like you were in control the whole way. You signed up for jingle bells? Another PB there if you are!

jake1970

Congrats on the PB nop.

Bungy Girl

Well done, Nop! Super time on a mucky day. Definitely sounds like there's more in the tank for Jingle Bells. Don't forget to say hi when you overtake me.

nop98

Firedance wrote: »

Wow, brilliant nop! And a superbly written report. Congrats on the pb

Thank you! Glad I didn't have to run all the way to and from Cabinteely this time

Myles Splitz wrote: »

Congrats on the PB sounds like the marathon strength has helped. Keep it up

Thanks Myles!

jake1970 wrote: »

Congrats on the PB nop.

Thanks Jake!

annapr wrote: »

Well done Nop! Sounds like you were in control the whole way. You signed up for jingle bells? Another PB there if you are!

Yes, Jingle Bells. Followed by the National Master Pairs Bridge championships!

There's a difference. The former is a painful 22 minutes. The latter is painful for the rest of the weekend.

Bungy Girl wrote: »

Well done, Nop! Super time on a mucky day. Definitely sounds like there's more in the tank for Jingle Bells. Don't forget to say hi when you overtake me.

Thanks BG - now, now, that I doubt! Out of interest, what is your JB PB? So I know how far off you I have to line up?

diego_b

Ah excellent stuff Nop, excellent report and even better run!! Congrats on that pb!

Bungy Girl

nop98 wrote: »

Thanks BG - now, now, that I doubt! Out of interest, what is your JB PB? So I know how far off you I have to line up?

I'd say line up just in front of me to provide a nice wind block . I did 21:05 in JB last year when my 'regular' 5K would have been a good 30-40 seconds slower. If the conditions are good it's a super fast course. Would love to dip under 21:00 this year but not sure if the speed is there at the moment.

laura_ac3

Well done nop, enjoyed that report.

Murph_D

Nice racing, N - well done, great time.

nop98

Bungy Girl wrote: »

I'd say line up just in front of me to provide a nice wind block . I did 21:05 in JB last year when my 'regular' 5K would have been a good 30-40 seconds slower. If the conditions are good it's a super fast course. Would love to dip under 21:00 this year but not sure if the speed is there at the moment.

Ah - I think I shall attach myself to your coat tails

laura_ac3 wrote: »

Well done nop, enjoyed that report.

Murph_D wrote: »

Nice racing, N - well done, great time.

Thank you Laura and Murph! Are you running JB too?

nop98

Sunday Nov 15: 6+M easy, 10.2km @ 5:58 [6.3M @ 9:38]

Busy Sunday with real life, meant there was no difficulty ensuring that aquinn would not be too annoyed with me (having already ignored her advice for the parkrun, I wanted to go for about 10M but only really had an hour to spare).

It was darkening already when I got out, combined with the slippery conditions meant I had little option in terms of routes. My safe, but boring option is to head towards the N11 and run along northbound towards Cabinteely and then turn around. I recall the days when that was right at my limit, distance-wise. Run was pretty uneventful today - although I could feel some lingering after effects of yesterday's run.

Weekly distance is back to about 20 miles.

Dubgal72

That was a great report N and an even greater run. You sounded very in control, well done and of course on the PB. A little early perhaps but it's done and I suspect there was a little left in the tank.

Have a chat/pm with the Grad mentor about a little sharpening work to do between now and Jingle Bells. You're looking at close to 21 mins, even 20.5x on a good day on that course.

hillsiderunner

Briliant parkrun, nop. And off extra miles but little speed training ... must keep that in mind when I'm tempted to push the easy runs!

nop98

Dubgal72 wrote: »

That was a great report N and an even greater run. You sounded very in control, well done and of course on the PB. A little early perhaps but it's done and I suspect there was a little left in the tank.

Have a chat/pm with the Grad mentor about a little sharpening work to do between now and Jingle Bells. You're looking at close to 21 mins, even 20.5x on a good day on that course.

Thanks DG. I will reach out, looks like a lot of novices grads are gunning for a fast 5k. Sub-21! I wish I had your confidence! I think 21:30 is the target.

hillsiderunner wrote: »

Briliant parkrun, nop. And off extra miles but little speed training ... must keep that in mind when I'm tempted to push the easy runs!

Thanks hillside, yes, lots of easy miles rule. First of all, it's enjoyable since it's, well, easy (albeit a little boring but that never bothered me). Second of all, you can run lots of times a week since it doesn't really take much out of you. And I guess I'm a good example that even at my limited level and capabilities you reap the benefits!

One thing tho, is to not fret the time/pace of the easy runs too much. In the beginning I was trying too hard to stick to a certain pace. I abandoned that for a "run by feel" strategy. Some easy runs were at or just over PMP, some were much slower. Probably all very wrong (DG look away!) but it worked for me and it also made it easy to run easy, if you get me!

Good luck with your training, delighted to hear you're mostly injury-free, do you have a target race in mind?

hillsiderunner

nop98 wrote: »

Thanks hillside, yes, lots of easy miles rule. First of all, it's enjoyable since it's, well, easy (albeit a little boring but that never bothered me). Second of all, you can run lots of times a week since it doesn't really take much out of you. And I guess I'm a good example that even at my limited level and capabilities you reap the benefits!

I did last night's run at 11:16 average pace (!) by trying the "breathe in through the nose" suggestion. Was a pain in the neck to be honest but was definitely easy pace.

I only have one definite goal race for 2016, and anyone who had to plough through pages of recces will know which one it is :rolleyes:. But I will be looking for a HM and maybe even a 10k for the spring. And I still have my eye on DCM but the real aim is to build up to 30 miles/week by the end of February and keep it there. Will be looking forward to a parkrun in January once I think I can bring it in under 25mins!

nop98

hillsiderunner wrote: »

I only have one definite goal race for 2016, and anyone who had to plough through pages of recces will know which one it is :rolleyes:. But I will be looking for a HM and maybe even a 10k for the spring.

Ah - cool, looking forward to following your progress to "that" race! As for a spring HM, well, there's always CNM2016 A bit of hill training never hurts!

hillsiderunner

nop98 wrote: »

Ah - cool, looking forward to following your progress to "that" race! As for a spring HM, well, there's always CNM2016 A bit of hill training never hurts!

I had thought of that one in fact ..... think it sells out very early each year, no? Would want to see how the build-up progresses for a while more ...

nop98

Sunday Nov 22: 13.9km @ 5:45 min/km [8.6M @ 9:15 min/mi]

Lovely crisp and cold morning, so I went up the local hills to enjoy the solitude and the stunning views. I brought my phone to take some snaps.

I went up Carrickgollogan Hill, the hard way, using Quarry Road. I was hoping to get a nice view of Carrickgollogan's East side, it's quite impressive but my phone's camera is just not good enough. I could have taken many pictures of the stunning houses, but instead I tried to capture the sharp end of the incline:



It may not look impressive, but it certainly stings much harder than Heartbreak Hill and the Hell of the West (and I speak from experience!).

Along the south slope of the Hill, I disturbed one of the locals having breakfast:



You can see Great Sugarloaf Mountain in the top left of the picture. I continued the climb up and after crossing to Barnaslingan, this is the view of the West side Carrickgollogan, looking back. You can clearly see the Ballychorus leadmine.



I continued the loop around Carrickgologan. The North end is the least attractive as it's the "main" road to Kilternan, and you have to watch the traffic and your footing. I usually run this part first "to get it over with" but today I went clockwise around the leadmine. Back down towards Shanganagh for a few more km's.

I had to speed up in the second part as I had gone up very slowly and stopped a several times to take pictures. It was most enjoyable but a little hard (and niggly) to keep the faster km's going.

Bungy Girl

Stunning pics! It may just be time to arrange other Boards trail run outing.

denis b

Nice route Nop. I know it reasonably well and have tracked over the hills there more than once.


+1 for a trail run outing.

nop98

Bungy Girl wrote: »

Stunning pics! It may just be time to arrange other Boards trail run outing.

denis b wrote: »

Nice route Nop. I know it reasonably well and have tracked over the hills there more than once.


+1 for a trail run outing.

Trail Run Outing ++ If the weather is like last weekend, it'll be awesome. It can always be combined with a Shanganagh Parkrun warmup.

Just to clarify, it's (small) backroads that I run these tracks on, not trails. There's not much difference tho and I am sure there are plenty of nice trails too. In fact, I shall recce that and report back.

nop98

First week of the Myles program, and already I've had to work around RL and other constraints.

Tuesday Nov 24: 4M easy: 6.8km @ 5:54 min/km [4.2M @ 9:29]
Per plan - usual short lunchtime loop with my personal coaching project.

Wednesday Nov 25: ~6M tempo: 9.2km @ 5:24 min/km [5.7M @ 8:41]
I had planned to do the Myles Wednesday session, but my DCM running buddy wanted to join so, we decided to head down to Cabinteely Park instead. We flew down as we had the winds in our backs. I pushed the pace on the downhill sections in the Park, and we scaled back to more manageable on the uphills. I think in the end we more or less captured the essence of the planned run.

Thursday: nada. Training course in work, blah, blah, bore.

Friday Nov 27: treadmill interval session: 5.3km @ 5:06 [3.2M @ 8:12]
5 x 400m intervals @ 13.5, 13.5, 14, 15, 16 km/h + 200m @ 17 km/h

Impromptu treadmill session. I was going to go running on the usual roads, but the weather was so bad that my running date stood me up. I headed to the dreaded treadmill. As usual, bored out of my tree within minutes, so I decided to do 400m faster sessions followed by 400m easy pace. Actually enjoyed the session more than usual - despite being the usual sweaty mess. Pushed the pace beyond what I would normally do during these sessions, but 17km/h (3:30 km/min, just 200m) really is about as fast I can go.

diego_b

Late to the party on your Connemarathon race report, great stuff that Nop.
I knew you had ran it so had a look back through your log to find it the coach in my club suggested earlier today that a few in the club travel up to do it this year. For now I am free that weekend and I was looking for a half to do in April so I might be running there this year. I think the half for now but never say never!

nop98

diego_b wrote: »

Late to the party on your Connemarathon race report, great stuff that Nop.
I knew you had ran it so had a look back through your log to find it the coach in my club suggested earlier today that a few in the club travel up to do it this year. For now I am free that weekend and I was looking for a half to do in April so I might be running there this year. I think the half for now but never say never!

Hey D - that would be splendid!

Fabulous day last year, absolutely loved it. The course isn't as hard as it's made out to be (but I always seem to say that)...

I haven't decided if I'll go back in 2016 - I'd love to, but it depends a little on my Dutch mates, if they're coming again or maybe another classic like Dingle. Given my current fitness-levels (or lack thereof) I'd be surprised if I even last the Half.

diego_b

nop98 wrote: »

Hey D - that would be splendid!

Fabulous day last year, absolutely loved it. The course isn't as hard as it's made out to be (but I always seem to say that)...

I haven't decided if I'll go back in 2016 - I'd love to, but it depends a little on my Dutch mates, if they're coming again or maybe another classic like Dingle. Given my current fitness-levels (or lack thereof) I'd be surprised if I even last the Half.

Cool I am looking forward to it, might be a group of 4 or 5 lads from my club traveling up for the weekend from Kerry for it. The coach is gauging interest at the moment and it sounds like a fine race from what I have heard.
Indeed often the talk about hills seems to be worse than the actual hills themselves!
Dingle is a great one if you're planning on a half in September, get back on those runners!!

nop98

I best start updating this log before it gets deleted due to lack of usage!

Sat (Dec 12): Shanganagh Parkrun (and some w/u and c/d km's) in 22m08. Probably the worst weather I've ran in so far. Pleased enough with the effort, albeit a bit meeeh at the lack of finishing kick. Turns out that one of the lads I was chasing is a parent of one of the other students in my sons class. Grrrr. I thought I had sorted out the schoolyard bragging rights.

Wed (Dec 16): Only run of the working week (which annoys me to no end). Very busy in work and now the intensity of DCM training has faded (and the weather is awful), it's easy to say, "mweeh" and not go running at lunchtime. But I got out with my DCM buddy and we belted down towards Cabinteely Park for our trusted loop, 5.7M @ 8:30 min/mi. Strava proudly announces that I am "trending faster" on this run (no sh*t, I have been running that loop a lot as "easy miles" filler during DCM so that was consistently >1 min/mi slower. Anyway. Good to be out and working up a sweat.

Sat (Dec 19): A spot of volunteering in Cabinteely, 84 runners turned out which is splendid. Nice to see MartaStew and meno, last time I saw them was when their 4h balloons inched away from me during DCM <insert violin playing here!>.

Sun (Dec 20): Finally out for a decent run, ~10M up Killiney Hill towards Dalkey and back. Proudly wearing my DCM top! Apart from the last km or 2, this felt all very controlled @ 9:17 min/mi despite the serious bite of some of these slopes have. For the first time since DCM, I have this proper "I ran today" feeling which is kinda awesome.

Planning wise, I signed up for the Raheny 5M (hope to see allot of fellow Novices) and I am considering the Wicklow Mountains Half Marathon with my Dutch buddies (which would mean no Connemara ).

denis b

Will be great to catch up at Raheny. Have entered as well so don't miss out on too many lunchtime runs N.

Firedance

nop98 wrote: »

Sat (Dec 19): A spot of volunteering in Cabinteely, 84 runners turned out which is splendid. Nice to see MartaStew and meno, last time I saw them was when their 4h balloons inched away from me during DCM <insert violin playing here!>.

Sun (Dec 20): Finally out for a decent run, ~10M up Killiney Hill towards Dalkey and back. Proudly wearing my DCM top! Apart from the last km or 2, this felt all very controlled @ 9:17 min/mi despite the serious bite of some of these slopes have. For the first time since DCM, I have this proper "I ran today" feeling which is kinda awesome.

84!!! that's brilliant, good to see no's increasing there & hopefully lots of new years resolutions will see them over the 100 in 2016

well done on the LR, perfect Killiney Hill weather today, can't wait to get up there over the holidays - focusing on Raheny will get you back into the running habbit very quickly, I see another smackdown in the offing there with so many graduates running it

nop98

denis b wrote: »

Will be great to catch up at Raheny. Have entered as well so don't miss out on too many lunchtime runs N.

I shall see what I can do, DB If you're looking for me in Raheny, I'll be clinging to your coattails.

Firedance wrote: »

84!!! that's brilliant, good to see no's increasing there & hopefully lots of new years resolutions will see them over the 100 in 2016

well done on the LR, perfect Killiney Hill weather today, can't wait to get up there over the holidays - focusing on Raheny will get you back into the running habbit very quickly, I see another smackdown in the offing there with so many graduates running it

If you're around these parts, let me know, we can run together. I'll be in Neths 26-30 and am playing a bridge tournament on the 1st (the "hangover" trophy ), but other than that