Hard work beats talent when talent fails to work hard

Firedance

Bungy Girl wrote: »

I'm getting it too :rolleyes:.

they can scoot right off with themselves, I feel a strongly worded email coming on

aquinn

I've reaction chain cycles so don't mind. It was adobe before that with 'make it flexible' . I must be on someone else PC.

What with all the KM, you know I haven't a clue what you are on about.

chickey2

aquinn wrote: »

What with all the KM, you know I haven't a clue what you are on about.

Lol! You'll just have to convert.

aquinn

Don't be ridiculous. Anna has an app for you to do that for me.

chickey2

So I've finished week 7 of the base building plan and all is going well. I did 10k on Tuesday, 10.2 on Wednesday including 18 mins@LT, 6.6 on Friday (it should have been 8 but I ran out of time!) and then 13k on Sunday.
Apart from the Sunday run, all the others were commutes which is a pain at these distances. I work 12km from home so I'm running along the luas line and jumping on the luas for a few stops before continuing. Not ideal, but at least I'm running at all! Once I get up to 11-12 k I'll just run all the way which avoids hanging around Luas platforms!
My Sunday run went great. I headed to Tymon, around and back home and was pleasantly surprised to see I was faster than last week, but my HR was lower, so I guess I'm improving. That's almost 40km for the week (almost 25 miles for those unable to convert ) This plan brings me up to 48km weekly and then I'll start my 8-10k plan.

chickey2

I'm delighted with myself today after last week's effort. I was away over the weekend which often leads to excuses, but I still got out and ended up doing more than planned.

Tues: 10.2 km @5:56 HR 158 Another luas run but timed it well so got to belgard 30 seconds before the luas!

Thurs: 11.8km @6:17 HR 163. Ran the whole way into work for the first time in ages. It was bright enough to run through tymon which is a much more pleasant run.

Fri: 9.4 km @6:32 HR 156. I kept this slow as I was tired from yesterday. Headed to the airport after this so lots of walking done.

Sat: no run but lots of walking. Racked up 25000 steps on my fitbit!

Sun: 16 km @6:16 HR 157. I'm so proud. After a night out I got up at 8 and went for a run around Bristol. I'll never complain about the hills in Tallaght again! I got totally lost but had my phone with a map so found my way back. I should have done 14km but it ended up as 16km. I was so glad I went out. It was a perfect day for running. I headed straight the amazing breakfast buffet and then headed to the spa fir a jacuzzi and steam. If only all Sunday runs were like this! Went for a lovely walk later and the to the airport. My fit bit nearly exploded as I did 34726 steps!

Total for week :47.4km

This week will be a challenge. Tomorrows run is fine but Wednesday we're heading to London. We're near Hyde Park so will try and get a few runs in. Must remember my sports bra this time!

hillsiderunner

Hyde Park and the rest of the green space round Kensington is great for running . Enjoy the holidays!

chickey2

A quick update from me. I'm currently on my phone, in bed in a motorway hotel in England with the rest of my family asleep!
Last week went well considering the travel. Got 10k done on Tuesday as normal before we left. Flew out Wednesday and got up early on Thursday for another 10k. I headed for Hyde Park which was great. I'd been there before, but not as a runner. The place was packed already at 7:30am with runners, cyclists and dog walkers. It was a gorgeous morning and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Had a long day walking around the museums later.
I skipped my Friday run as it just didn't suit, but got out again in Sunday. This time I was in Highgate woods which was lovely. I only managed 7km as I didn't have time to keep going. We arrived in Victoria that evening and the kids and husband were tired so I nipped out for a quick run before it got dark. What an amazing run! I managed to see Westminster, Big Ben, the horse guards parade, trafalgar square and Buckingham palace all in 6km! I'm really loving this running tourism, it's a great way to see a city.
This Tuesday I repeated that run but added bit extra by doing part of Hyde Park as well. Did about 10 k. We then left London and headed north. Sadly this was for a funeral rather than a holiday so I haven't had a chance to run as I've been childminding/shopping etc. Tomorrow I'm free though so going to head out and explore the motorway services on the M56. I'm not hopeful!

chickey2

I'm eventually finished my base building plan and have just started a proper plan, so I think I'll start logging my runs properly now I have something to log!

The base building went very well, I'm much fitter now that I was back in January and I've increased my milage (kilomatrage?) from 51.3km in January, 113.6km in February to 152.9km in March. I had a bit of a wobble last week after I posted. I missed two runs, then felt crap so ditched the third. Then I had a look at all the runs I've done since January and realised out of 40 runs I only missed 5, 3 of which were in the last week. So looking at the whole picture it wasn't too bad. I've definitely gotten fitter too as my pace has increased a good bit for the same HR.

So this week so far:

Mon 28th: Rest. This was a proper rest. Only got off the sofa (surrounded by chocolate eggs) to go to the cinema :rolleyes:

Tues 29th: 10km general aerobic with 6x100m strides and 6x12 sec hills: I was dismayed to wake up at 6am to find it was dark! I really don't like this clock changing thing! Anyway, it brightened up quickly enough. It was nice to do a bit of speed but lost count and only did 5 strides. I was short of time so instead of the 6x12 sec hills I did 6x sprints up the stairs at work! I used the back stairs so only the security guards would have seen me.
Total:10.2km @6:00 HR158

Wed 30th:rest. Although I did do a good bit of walking.

Thurs 31st: 13km endurance: This is supposed to be a gradual increase from 65-78% heart rate reserve, which for me is 151-171. My first km was @6:29 pace and HR was 150 and the last was 5:46 HR175. Maybe a bit fast at the end but I felt great. My breathing was still easy (I was still breathing in through my nose). The average was 6:04 HR163 which is a lot better than a 13 km run I did in February which was at 6:34 HR 165.

annapr

Lovely to read a log in modern language ....

laura_ac3

annapr wrote: »

Lovely to read a log in modern language ....

Would you stop with this corrupting influence......

Chickey - what's the target race(s) coming up for the plan? Sorry if I missed you mentioning it recently

Firedance

laura_ac3 wrote: »

Would you stop with this corrupting influence......

Chickey - what's the target race(s) coming up for the plan? Sorry if I missed you mentioning it recently

DCM dontcha know - all the cool kids are doing it :cool:

chickey2

Ah Laura, I was corrupted before I met Anna!
How are you getting on yourself?

Firedance is right, DCM is the big goal for the year. I'm going to sign up for the race series too. Next race will probably be the Tallaght 5k as last year was my 5k pb so I'd love to beat it.

FD, will you be following the meno plan again for DCM? I think I will so it would be great if someone else was too!

Fri 01 11km with 3x8min @LT, 3min recovery: glad I got out early today looking at the weather out there now! Started with a 15 min warm up and then into the intervals. I ran it purely by HR. I'd programmed the watch so it beeped if I was out of range so didn't need to be looking at it. The average pace for the intervals were 5:09/4:54/5:12. I was so thrilled to see a number starting with a 4! HR was supposed to be 166-186 and the intervals were 178/179/180 so I was really happy. If I can keep that up I should pb in my next 5k (which garmin tells me is 24:18, but that was watch time rather than chip time)
Total 12.2km (as I took a wrong turn :-()

I've given in and joined Strava. I'm not quite sure how it works yet. I'll have to find the boards group.

Firedance

chickey2 wrote: »

FD, will you be following the meno plan again for DCM? I think I will so it would be great if someone else was too!

I've given in and joined Strava. I'm not quite sure how it works yet. I'll have to find the boards group.

Yes I sure wiill! It's a really super plan

I see you found me on strava :you'll be following a whole lot of nothing for a while the boardies will find you....:p

chickey2

Greetings from Valencia! What a great city to run in! There's a park that used to be a river running through the city centre and it's perfect for a run as it's flat and goes under the roads, and it's really scenic. There's a 5km runners lane that even has 100m markers.
Today's session was supposed to be 2 sets of 4x200m with 200m jog recovery. It's the first time I've ever done 200s! I was quite hungover so thought I'd just do 10km easy, but when I saw the flat, uninterrupted running lane with 100m markers it was perfect. Did the first set in 43/43/41/41 seconds. I was dying after the last one though and felt a bit faint. Since I was alone in a foreign city I decided to skip the second set and just run easy. Did a total of just over 9km.

Did 14.3 km on Sunday for my lsr. I headed up to the water works and ignored Murph_D as he ran past! I did think he looked a bit like Murph but didn't think he'd be out that way.

Back home tomorrow and no more flights for a while! Yay!

Murph_D

Don't feel bad - I didn't recognise you either . Friendly bunch of runners around there all the same. Most of them smiled and waved.

Nice 200s. That park sounds nice. But what happened to the river? :eek:

chickey2

Murph_D wrote: »

Don't feel bad - I didn't recognise you either . Friendly bunch of runners around there all the same. Most of them smiled and waved.

Nice 200s. That park sounds nice. But what happened to the river? :eek:

Apparently they diverted the river in the 50s as the city kept getting flooded. Imagine they diverted the liffey and you could just run through the city to phoenix park! It's an amazing facility. I'd definitely recommend Valencia as a city break for runners!

chickey2

So I got back home on Wednesday but was too tired to run so left it til Thursday.

Thurs 7: 13km endurance. I was happy with this, managed a bit of a progression run starting at 6:14 and finishing in 5:20 pace.
Total 13 km @5:50 average HR 159

Fri 8: 13 km with 2x10 mins and 1x8 min at LT. I spent ages the night before programing this in to my watch but it didn't transfer properly so had to do it manually 😞. Did 15 min warm and started at LT pace. Stupidly forgot and ran for 12 mins before I remembered it was supposed to be 10. I just did the other two reps for 8 mins each so the total time at LT was the same. Ave pace per rep was 5:20/5:11/5:12. Could be better.
Total 13km

Sunday: 16 km endurance. I decided to head down the dodder for a change. I forgot to change my watch back to autolap and didn't notice til 8km when I turned to come back. Definitely harder in the way back (uphill!). I felt pretty tired for this run. When I tried to upload my run it said my first lap was 8 km in 50 minutes, which was correct, but my lap moving time was over 276 hours! Must have been a glitch from changing auto lap mid run. Anyway it wouldn't load on to Strava as it knew it was dodgy!
Total 16.1 km @6:17 HR 167 not great

Happy enough with the weekly distance though, over 50km!

chickey2

Now for this week!
I was off Monday and it was a rest day (thankfully with that weather!) but I headed to amphibian king to get some runners. Finally picked a pair of mizunos. I was put off by the fact they are white, but they were the best fit so guess that's more important. I just can't wear them in the rain, or if there's mud 😜. Guess they won't be white for long!

Tues 12: 11km including 6x12 s hills and 6x100m strides. Did this in the evening for a change, and a lovely evening it was too. Hit the hill in dodder Valley Park which takes me exactly 12 seconds to run up. I love short hills! Fast enough to make you feel like you're working but short enough that they're over before you know. After the hills it took a while to get my HR back down despite a very slow jog. Loved my new shoes, they're lovely and light despite giving great support.

chickey2

Turns out the hills weren't so good after all! I headed out last Friday to run home from work but after 2km got a sudden sharp spasm in my calf and had to stop. Managed to limp to the luas and make it home somehow. I was worried I had torn my calf so iced and elevated it and took it very easy over the weekend.

I'm just back from a visit to Miles Splitz who told me it's not torn, but I probably took the hills too fast and damaged it. I should be back running by Friday so could be a lot worse.
So no running this week, but I do have a new appreciation of being able to run.

I've signed up for the Tallaght 5k on may 1st. It's not a goal race but it should give me an idea of where I'm at as I haven't raced since last September.

Thinking about some beer mile training once the race series 5mile is over, anyone got a good plan! :-)

Firedance

chickey2 wrote: »

Thinking about some beer mile training once the race series 5mile is over, anyone got a good plan! :-)

Yipee! I have no plan except to swap wine for beer the next few months!

Glad to hear no major damage - sure you hardly warmed the bench at all

chickey2

I've been told chugging fizzy water during a run is good training (and looks a bit better if you're running in public!)

laura_ac3

Glad to hear you won't be out for long. Good on you being so sensible! A shining beacon to the rest of us

Bungy Girl

Delighted it's not going to be a long lay-off. I hear ya on the appreciation of being able to run. I don't usually take it for granted but sometimes we need a little reminder of how lucky we are to be able to run (most of the time!).

chickey2

Fri 22: did a brief jog to test out the calf. I took it very slow and tried to concentrate on my form. Happy to say although there was a bit of stiffness in my calf it wasn't painful, and eased off as I ran. I kept it short although I felt I could run longer. Think thats a HR low record for me!
Total 3.3 km HR 147

Sun 24: I set out early so I could watch the London marathon. How my life has changed! Decided to do 10 km very easy and see how I felt. Kept close to home in case there was any problems but all was good. Still have stiffness in the calf but no pain. I made sure to stretch properly after but I'm still a bit stiff now a few hours later.
Total 10.6 km HR 157

So I've missed a week from the plan, but it was a recovery week so I think I'll just do the recovery this week and then continue with the plan (all going well). I'm running the 5k in Tallaght next Sunday but the idea of a pb is gone so I'll take it easy and just incorporate it into my long run.

El Caballo

There's probably no need to redo the recovery week if you feel fresh and aren't going to race flat out this weekend. The missed week would've gave you the same effect and should've gave you plenty of time to recover. Mind the calf though if you do ahead with a normal week.

chickey2

El Caballo wrote: »

There's probably no need to redo the recovery week if you feel fresh and aren't going to race flat out this weekend. The missed week would've gave you the same effect and should've gave you plenty of time to recover. Mind the calf though if you do ahead with a normal week.

Great, I wasn't sure if I was being over cautious. Tues has another 6x12s hill sprints but I'll just do strides instead as recommended by Myles as he thinks that's what did the damage.

chickey2

Update for this week so far

Mon 25: rest

Tues 26: 11 km general aerobic with 6*12s hills (I did 12s strides instead). This went quite well. Calf felt fine and the strides went well. Stupid HR monitor played up though and said my HR was 68 during one stride and 207 during the next! Average was 158 for the run which was about right

Wed 27: 14km endurance. I was really happy with this run. Started off slow (6:30) and ended up at 5:45. Average was 6:01 HR 159

Thurs 28: rest. Although with all the talk of pilates I decided to give it a go! Just stuck on a DVD I got ages ago and never watched. It was only 30 mins but it was hard! I'm going to try and do it twice a week if I can as I really need to strengthen my core. I did have a childish chuckle when yer one on the DVD kept saying "you need to really control your box"!

Fri 29: 13 km with 5*1km@5k pace. It started badly so I should have known. Thought it was very cold so wore my long pants and neck warmer. With all the messing about I forgot to go to the toilet before I left. Got out and was too warm and needed the loo before I'd even warmed up! Kept going though as I needed to get to work. The first km was good, nice steady pace. I had checked the calculator last night and was aiming for 4:45. Did the first in 4:51. Next one was on the only slight incline on my route but tried to keep the pace although I was struggling a bit. 4:47, a bit better. Third was going great til I felt an all to familiar cramp in my calf and I had to slow to a jog. Still managed 4:58 although the last few metres were jogged. I decided I couldn't do anymore intervals but I still had to get to work. The calf was cramping but I could still jog slowly so did a jog/walk the rest of the way. I was also dying for the bathroom. Glad I wore my long pants and neck warmer in the end as I was freezing once I slowed down. Got to work late, freezing, needing the toilet and in foul form! Did I mention I ached all over due to the pilates too?! The only positive is I did the full 13km!

The plan has a 5 km recovery tomorrow and the 16 km endurance on Sunday. I'm not sure what to do with the calf. I'll be able to do the 5 km tomorrow and I was going to incorporate the 16 km into the tallaght 5k on Sunday but I'm having second thoughts. I know I'll be tempted to run fast and I really don't want to risk injury.

Firedance

mind that calf.... did you discover what's causing it? sorry I should just have read back a few posts!

chickey2

Firedance wrote: »

mind that calf.... did you discover what's causing it? sorry I should just have read back a few posts!

Not sure. Myles thought it was fatigue caused by hill repeats. It was fine most of last week but only bothers me when I run fast.

Sat 30: 5km recovery. This ended up as a family run with me running, the two kids on bikes and hubbie jog/walking behind us! It included lots of stops and a visit to the playground so it was very relaxed. This is my first week doing 5 days of running so this was the extra day. No bother!
5km@7:12 HR 137

Sun 01: 16 km endurance was the plan. I decided to do the Tallaght 5k but slowly. I did over 7 km before the race so I wouldn't be tempted to take off! To give myself some kind of challenge I aimed to do even splits of 6min km and come in at exactly 30 mins, a pacing exercise I suppose. Did OK, and finished just over 29 minutes on the clock. I felt like I should have had a sign saying "training run" on me, as I felt like telling people, I could run faster if I wanted to! My HR was quite high considering the pace. I don't know if it was because it was a race or if I'm coming down with something. Had a quick coffee and cake and did another 3 km home so total of 15.3km.

Weekly total 58.6km

Very tired now and my calf is stiff so I have my feet up and going to rest properly.