DCM 2016 Graduates: Keep On Running

The Muppet

The time has come for us to fly the nest of the 2016 Mentored Novices thread for we are no longer aspiring novice marathon runners. All the hard work, long hours on solo runs in all weather, the mental and physical challenge necessary to get our bodies prepared to run our first marathon is behind us and we have proudly graduated as marathon runners.

Those of us who ran Dublin City Marathon are still in recovery mode, some back running a little and some not but hopefully all niggles are settling down. Our Berlin graduate Tailgunner is a little further down the recovery road. Its most likely all our thoughts are now turning to our short and longer term goals.

Similar to the thread last year started by Nop98 here, we can use this thread to track our progress and identify what our next goals are. Some of us are going to focus on improving our performance over shorter distance while more of us have another crack at the marathon firmly in our sights. What ever our personal goals are hopefully we will all remain active in this thread and we will build on the great support and camaraderie we have established over the last few months of training.

Our esteemed mentor NOP98 has mentioned the possibility of getting an experienced shorter-distance runner help out on the graduates thread, Watch this space for more on that.

To start us off if we could all answer a few questions just to get and idea of everyone’s aspirations for the weeks and months ahead.

a : What are your next goals?

b: What type of training to you intends to do over the winter?

c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?

Finally on behalf of all the Graduates and not forgetting those of us who started out on the training and unfortunately had to pull out through injury etc I want to thank Nop98, Firedance, FBOT01, Aquinn, Murph_D, Bungy Girl and their supporting crew for giving so freely of their time and expertise in preparing us so well and equipping us with the knowledge to become marathon runners.

The link to the "Boards Graduate Plans 2016 by Myles Splitz" plan is here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1LOkLQ_a9NHWe97yaRkfF6ArFmCHmtf9y1tU0LR7uMr8/edit#gid=950799331

Maximus Alexander

*Sniff*

I love that new thread smell.

Seriously, to echo the above, huge thanks to nop98, Firedance and all the rest of you for the encouragement and advice over the last few months. It was quite a journey that will live long in the memory!

The Muppet

Maximus Alexander wrote: »

*Sniff*

I love that new thread smell.

Seriously, to echo the above, huge thanks to nop98, Firedance and all the rest of you for the encouragement and advice over the last few months. It was quite a journey that will live long in the memory!

It is a little sad isn't it , we're a sentimental lot.

paddydriver

Thread Followed.. Here we Go!

Thanks TM for setting up!

ToriV

The Muppet wrote: »

It is a little sad isn't it , we're a sentimental lot.

So much more than I thought it would be. Some days I want to go back a month or two and do it all again. I miss having little squares to fill in on my fridge training plan...The shared mass panic....taper madness. Good times!

I will have a good think about those questions and see where I am. I have the opportunity to do London next year, but need to think about it.....

jameshayes

a : What are your next goals?

I've 3:

1. Start enjoying casual running, not having a target, plan or any other criteria to meet - to just go out and see where my legs take me.
   
2. I do hope to hit the Sub 20 mark soon but I'm not going to let it dictate my life too much.
   
3. In the new year I will begin Ironman 70.3 training with a hope to do Dublin in August. Swimming will be the hard part for me I'd say I could just about manage 2 lengths of a pool at the moment, I cycle daily as a commute so hopefully that might make the transition to long distance cycling a bit easier.

b: What type of training to you intends to do over the winter?
Casual running, keeping up with the running group in work and carrying on with the strength and conditioning sessions in the gym.

c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?
Hopefully my speed will naturally increase with experience, I'm running 15 months now and have an estimated VO2 max of 49 I'd like that to improve a bit.

Wubble Wubble

Thanks a million for getting this going TM. To answer the questions briefly...

a : What are your next goals?

Sub-20 5k by end of the year, that's the immediate target. PB is currently 20:36 (from May of this year). I'll have a few chances to attack this once I'm back up to speed. After that, crack my 5 mile PB in Raheny (currently 34:08, Terenure 2014).

b: What type of training do you intend to do over the winter?

More speed work, definitely. Other than parkruns and Raheny, there's some good cross country races for me to get stuck into over the next few months. I've been fairly weak in these so far, compared to road races. Hopefully that will change this winter.


c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?

I'd like to think that, provided I stay fit and healthy and all the other supports are in place, that I'll be able to talk about a strong performance in DCM 2017 after the event. A time in the 3:20-3:30 range feels very achievable at the moment. No other marathons in between, sadly Barcelona (budget) and Connemara (exams) had to be ruled out this time. Longest race in the coming months will be a half marathon. Maybe the Kinvara half at the beginning of March? Is fearr an Iarthar

kin9pin

Thanks for setting this up TM and thanks again to nop and the crew for getting us through DCM.

a : What are your next goals?
Short-short-term just to get back running. That cold I was avoiding during taper finally hit me two-fold last week. Probably a good time to be ill as it's letting my legs recover fully
Short-term I'm signed up for the Jingle Bells 5k. I have what I hope is a pretty soft 5k pb of 23:28 so I'm expecting to beat that. I'll aim to get a parkrun in beforehand.
Mid-term I have the London Marathon in April. Already have my plan pinned up in the kitchen so looking forward to that. My aim for London is to aim for sub 4, but I'll be happy just to better my Dublin time.

b: What type of training to you intends to do over the winter?
I'm looking at the Asics sub-4 plan for London. It's a 16 week plan so starts properly on 2nd Jan. There's a bit more speed work in this and some more steady/marathon pace runs, which is the area I felt I was lacking a bit for DCM (maybe due to the missed pace runs when I was injured?).
I've put a lead-in plan together to get me to the end of the December with adequate mileage to start the plan.

c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?
Hopefully I will have completed my 3rd marathon (DCM 2017) by then. I'll have to clear it at home though, I don't have any brownie points to cash in at this stage!
I'm not too worried about shorter distance PB's, I tend to enjoy the longer distances more.

aquinn

Arrghhhhhhhhhhhhh, I'm still reading all your race reports.

Well done to all and all the very best with recovery and the future.

I've made amazing friends from our 2014 outing who have made a massive difference to me.

Fbjm

Cool, new thread. Hi fellow marathoners! Be cool if we can keep this community going here.

Maximus Alexander

What are your next goals?

I've nearly completed all the goals I set for myself at the start of the year (doing a marathon wasn't even on that list :pac:). I've to get back running and go past my 1000 mile goal... 30km to go! Another goal I had was a sub-21 5k but I did DCM instead and will be nowhere near that. Still, a PB at Jingle Bells will do; something starting with 22 would be nice.

After that, not sure yet. Get the mileage back up and then set new goals for the new year. I'm strongly considering a spring marathon but have made no commitments yet.

What type of training to you intends to do over the winter?

I'll probably return to the approximate format of my DCM training, but with shorter LSRs and some faster stuff in the middle of the week.

Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?

I'd like to have just wrapped up a successful DCM 2017 campaign with PBs at all distances and that should be very achievable!

Fbjm

a : What are your next goals?

I had a goal to run the Clontarf Half Marathon next weekend, but it turns out I have a stress fracture in my right foot! Can't walk for too long a time, let alone run. That's €28 down the drain. So my new goal is to run the Great Limerick Run on the 30th of April next year. I'm already excited for that

b: What type of training to you intend to do over the winter?

It all depends on how long it takes my injury to heal up. Once I'm recovered I'd like to be doing a half marathon every weekend, keep me going.

c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?

In 12 months I want to have run three or four marathons. The Limerick one in April and the DCM next October are definites, the Waterford marathon in June is also a possibility depending on how long it takes me to recover from Limerick. Then after, we'll see where we go!

kittyclaws

Thanks for starting the new thread TM - does this mean I have to start running again!
I've only ran once since DCM and my hips were really sore, so I've taken another week off, I'll try another 5k on Sunday and see how I get on. I have a number for the Run in the Dark but waiting till Sunday before I decide if Ill still do it.

a : What are your next goals?
My main goal is to get faster and work on my core - or lack thereof. I want to get a good speed and strength training program and stick to it.

b: What type of training to you intends to do over the winter?
I'm planning on taking it easy over Christmas - just enjoy running and no races until the new year (Apart from RITD!).

c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?
Faster! I can just about scrape a sub 30 5k, would love to get a couple of minutes off this. I'm hoping to do a good few more park runs in the new year.

scotindublin

Sad to see the old thread go but proud of everyone that we have made it to the Graduates thread!

Thanks to TM for setting it up....I will get the questions answered later.....my only short term goal just now is getting out of work for the weekend!!

Safrongirl

Hello everyone ,
Nice to see so many moved over already !
I will have to have a think about my goals - from now until Christmas is a bit mental for me - my builders are finished my extension and its their last day tomorrow - yipee so major house cleaning / painting / decorating will have to start . I work in retail so from now until the new year its just crazy . I have a family trip to Disney Paris in 2 weeks and I cannot wait.
I have run twice this week - a nice 5Km on the threadmill and then 11KM in local forest - got soaked through the other day and even when I came home and had a shower still couldnt warm up. If I could at least keep up 2 days running from now until Christmas I would be happy just to keep ticking over and then in January will plan some goals for the year.
So can anyone recommed a real water proof / breathable jacket - I have one but its useless - your hot and sticky and I was soaked in it - think a good one will be a good investment for the next few months.

robinwing

Safrongirl wrote: »

Hello everyone ,
Nice to see so many moved over already !
I will have to have a think about my goals - from now until Christmas is a bit mental for me - my builders are finished my extension and its their last day tomorrow - yipee so major house cleaning / painting / decorating will have to start . I work in retail so from now until the new year its just crazy . I have a family trip to Disney Paris in 2 weeks and I cannot wait.
I have run twice this week - a nice 5Km on the threadmill and then 11KM in local forest - got soaked through the other day and even when I came home and had a shower still couldnt warm up. If I could at least keep up 2 days running from now until Christmas I would be happy just to keep ticking over and then in January will plan some goals for the year.
So can anyone recommed a real water proof / breathable jacket - I have one but its useless - your hot and sticky and I was soaked in it - think a good one will be a good investment for the next few months.

I have a Berghaus shell jacket ( Gore Tex ) i find it good and I run outside all winter
http://www.mandmdirect.ie/01/details/BE1048/Berghaus-Womens-Gategill-2-Layer-Gore-Tex-Shell-Jacket-Blue-Blue

The Muppet

a : What are your next goals?
My Immediate goals are to get back running a decent milage each week and enjoying it . I am also helping my daughter with her couch25k at the moment and the plan is to run a 5 k race together when she is ready, I'd love that. I'm signed up for jingle bells too so I will be giving that a blast, was carrying an injury for it last year so I'll be trying to beat that .

b: What type of training do you intend to do over the winter?

My number one priority is strength and conditioning so Pilates supplemented with something else is a definite. Our new Mentor will be along shortly I'm looking forward to tapping into her knowledge to improve my speed. I will also keep the structure of easy , paced and long runs each week when I get back into it properly.


c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?

Once I stay fit and continue to run I'll be happy but In 12 months I may well be writing my DCM 2017 report , I have promised my daughter that if she is up to 20 miles a week by the time next years novices thread starts and she signs up for that I'll do the training and Marathon with her. That may not happen but I suspect it will, shes quite determined when she sets her sights on a goal and is doing really well at the moment.

The great North Run will be on the cards, I'd love to do that so I will be entering the ballot for that. I will also do some of the race Series depending on fitting into which ever plan I'm on then. Frank Duffy I'm coming for you.

kin9pin

Oh, I have 76 miles left to get my 100 1000 miles for the year. Add that to the short term goals

kin9pin wrote: »

Thanks for setting this up TM and thanks again to nop and the crew for getting us through DCM.

a : What are your next goals?
Short-short-term just to get back running. That cold I was avoiding during taper finally hit me two-fold last week. Probably a good time to be ill as it's letting my legs recover fully
Short-term I'm signed up for the Jingle Bells 5k. I have what I hope is a pretty soft 5k pb of 23:28 so I'm expecting to beat that. I'll aim to get a parkrun in beforehand.
Mid-term I have the London Marathon in April. Already have my plan pinned up in the kitchen so looking forward to that. My aim for London is to aim for sub 4, but I'll be happy just to better my Dublin time.

b: What type of training to you intends to do over the winter?
I'm looking at the Asics sub-4 plan for London. It's a 16 week plan so starts properly on 2nd Jan. There's a bit more speed work in this and some more steady/marathon pace runs, which is the area I felt I was lacking a bit for DCM (maybe due to the missed pace runs when I was injured?).
I've put a lead-in plan together to get me to the end of the December with adequate mileage to start the plan.

c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?
Hopefully I will have completed my 3rd marathon (DCM 2017) by then. I'll have to clear it at home though, I don't have any brownie points to cash in at this stage!
I'm not too worried about shorter distance PB's, I tend to enjoy the longer distances more.

Bungy Girl

Hello Graduates!

Sorry we couldn’t get you Mo. Or Sonia. Budget constraints :rolleyes:.

Welcome one and all to the 2016 Graduates thread. My name is BG (not really ) and I will be your mentor as you transition from graduates to fully qualified independent runners.

Firstly congratulations to each and every one who trained for and completed the marathon. I have followed the thread (full disclosure: may have missed one or two of the 418 pages ) and read your reports and am very impressed with the hard work, dedication and sheer determination shown by the Class of 2016.

So, what now? Well, please continue to answer the questions posed by The Muppet in the introductory post (thanks TM) and I’ll do my best to answer any training questions you may have. I will be enlisting the help of Nop’s expert team of backroom staff to supplement the many and varied gaps in my knowledge :pac::pac::pac:.

I’m recommending that everyone who is injury-free does either Jingle Bells on 3/12 or their local parkrun. The purpose of this is twofold: to set a benchmark for your future training AND to give you a short-term aim to work towards this side of the holiday season. Also, someone will probably make flapjacks .

With apologies in advance for the Wizard of Oz theme (I haven't even got to the Flying Monkeys yet :eek:), I’ll leave it there for now and check in on y’all again over the weekend. Happy running!

The Muppet

Bungy Girl wrote: »

Hello Graduates!

Sorry we couldn’t get you Mo. Or Sonia. Budget constraints :rolleyes:.

Welcome one and all to the 2016 Graduates thread. My name is BG (not really ) and I will be your mentor as you transition from graduates to fully qualified independent runners....................

Brilliant BG and the support team, and thanks for taking us under your wing, I for one am really looking forward to doing some faster stuff after all the slow easy runs of marathon training.

nop98

Super excited to see the grads thread up and running - but a little sad that the kids have flown the nest and are all grown-up grads now ...

I'm so pleased that BG will help you transition from marathon grads to shorter-distance speedsters, and some might even be encouraged to leave the roads and run in the mud instead :eek:

I'll follow the thread with a keen eye and looking forward to seeing most of you at Jingle Bells!

Ososlo

Good luck to everyone in the months ahead on this thread, and I'm absolutely delighted to see BG will be guiding you all on your journeys! Super choice Nop. It will be great to see her extensive knowledge and experience being imparted and put to great use here on the thread. Youse are in fantastic hands, Graduates!
Her log is well worth following too. Good luck all!

scotindublin

24 miles done this year Andy that's some going 😉.....might want to get a few more under your belt for London!

kin9pin wrote: »

Oh, I have 76 miles left to get my 100 miles for the year. Add that to the short term goals

scotindublin

Firstly thanks to BG for taking on us Graduates who I know are a keen and determined bunch!

a : What are your next goals?
Short term goal is to keep up the regular routine of running I am thinking about 2 days mid week and 1 longer one at the weekend. Would love to get under 20 minutes for 5k;Jingle Bells might just be a bit soon after the marathon for this. But plan to do some more speed stuff in December when time allows and give it a go at the Tom Brennan on Jan 1st. Will be doing the Raheny 5 aswell....bring on the chocolates!!

Also hit the 1000 miles for the year mark....just under 100 to go! Look into joining a club.

b: What type of training to you intends to do over the winter?

Hopefully supplement the running with some more gym work/core strength.


c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?

Number 1 still enjoying it!
Number 2 stay injury free.

Join a club and be an active member. Keep on improving and learning and you never know maybe give DCM 17 a lash!

kin9pin

scotindublin wrote: »

24 miles done this year Andy that's some going 😉.....might want to get a few more under your belt for London!

just noticed (and fixed) that!

FITZA

Hello all...thank you to TM for starting the thread, thank you to BG for taking us on and thank you to NOP and all other contributors for getting us here

a : What are your next goals?
As I'm sitting here with an ice pack on my knee and hoping that I will be back running on Sunday, I can only say my main goal is to get this knee sorted:( I have entered the Jingle Bells 5k so all going well that will be my next outing. Other than that I have no immediate goals except to get a few parkruns done in Naas.

b: What type of training to you intends to do over the winter?
I hope to train similar days to the marathon...3 midweek runs and a longer run on a Saturday and a cross/shorter run on a Sunday.

c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?
I never thought I would run a marathon, I never thought I would want to run a marathon. When I was running the marathon, in those last few kms I swore I would never do this again...however...within a couple of days of the marathon I wanted to do it again, but now with an injury that has stopped me running I am concerned I might not or my body might not be able for another one. If all was good I would like to have a couple of half marathons completed and if all was great I would have 2017 marathon behind me Won't get too hung up on it though.

spaceylou

Thanks for setting this up TM and great stuff getting BG on board to mentor us!

On the phone right now so won't answer the questions asked other than short term is to race jingle bells at start of Dec and commit to more parkrun tourism in 2017

GOOSEPAUL

Thanks TM for setting up the new thread and to our new mentor BG. On the phone atm and will answer questions later on.

A big thanks again to Nop, Firedance and their backroom team for all your hard work.

The Black Oil

Hey

Thanks for setting this up and for all of the past support and what's to come.

a: What are your next goals?

Change my watch back to km. :pac: Stay active on this thread/forum. Decide on whether to get contact lenses. Catch up with the family member who also did the marathon at the Christmas do. We'll bore the pants off everyone else. Jingle Bells 5k. Might visit my friend in the UK and squeeze in a park run whilst there. Haven't gone back out running yet. Would like to get to my park run time down under 23, then a minute less over time and get to sub 20. If people 10-20 years older than me can manage it I can. Been to the gym a few times - completely new to lunges and all of that lark...

b: What type of training do you intend to do over the winter?
Try out the DCM official head lamp. Not get bored of gym work. Would like to keep up some level of a regular running. FITZA's suggestion of 3 and 1 is what I've in mind too. Whether I'll do that remains to be seen. Kinda would like to do similar, but don't want to miss out on park run, so will see about structure, etc.

c: Where do you hope to see yourself to be in 12 months with your running?

Hopefully another DCM under my belt. I enjoyed it too much not to revisit. :P The chap at the gym seemed to think I could crack sub 4. I don't know why as I didn't tell him much about my experience. I'm not remotely thinking about times, pace goals or anything like that. Ticking over during winter is the only thing on my mind at the moment.

annapr

Bungy Girl wrote: »

Hello Graduates!

Sorry we couldn’t get you Mo. Or Sonia. Budget constraints :rolleyes:.

Welcome one and all to the 2016 Graduates thread. My name is BG (not really ) and I will be your mentor as you transition from graduates to fully qualified independent runners.

Firstly congratulations to each and every one who trained for and completed the marathon. I have followed the thread (full disclosure: may have missed one or two of the 418 pages ) and read your reports and am very impressed with the hard work, dedication and sheer determination shown by the Class of 2016.

So, what now? Well, please continue to answer the questions posed by The Muppet in the introductory post (thanks TM) and I’ll do my best to answer any training questions you may have. I will be enlisting the help of Nop’s expert team of backroom staff to supplement the many and varied gaps in my knowledge :pac::pac::pac:.

I’m recommending that everyone who is injury-free does either Jingle Bells on 3/12 or their local parkrun. The purpose of this is twofold: to set a benchmark for your future training AND to give you a short-term aim to work towards this side of the holiday season. Also, someone will probably make flapjacks .

With apologies in advance for the Wizard of Oz theme (I haven't even got to the Flying Monkeys yet :eek:), I’ll leave it there for now and check in on y’all again over the weekend. Happy running!

Stop apologising Dorothy!

Graduates, you are lucky to have one of the most dedicated, disciplined, sensible and smartest runners on here as your mentor. And possibly the only boardsie to ever win an international prize of a pineapple. :pac:

Be careful though, she might drag you off that yellow brick road into a muddy field!!

Wubble Wubble

Sat 12/11 - Porterstown parkrun, 3.1 miles in 21:56

Time's not really that important when reverse taper/post marathon recovery is still ongoing. However, as I shuffled around my warmup lap, I made a conscious decision to try and take it up a notch from last Saturday's effort.

Similarly, I started at the back (along with my buddy from the first half of the marathon) and proceeded to wind my way through the field. I'd cleared over half of them by the end of Lap 1. No problems with the leg, all comfortable. Lap 2, a bit quicker, continuing to pick off people, including the lead female. By the end I was up to about 12th or 13th out of 67 or 68 starters. No issues at all, so I was ready to up it once more for the final stint. A guy wearing a DCM 2016 top was up ahead as I made my way around the bottom of the park. No excuses here, I'm normally faster than him. Sure enough, I caught him with a km to go. I had a plan in my head this morning that once I pass someone, they stay passed. I tried to keep a nice tempo going to the end, while resisting the temptation to sprint out the downhill to the finish. This I managed fairly well, keeping marathon top (and another lad who I'd passed shortly before him) at bay on the home straight.

That time wasn't in the script. Having said that, I felt fine throughout, and some stretches and foam rolling when I got home sorted out any minor issues. I won't be running the Clontarf HM next week; the 5 mile (I have the option to switch) or another parkrun will be my next timed effort.