Next 5! Next 5!

Sunday 14th May - Mungret St Paul's 10 k - annual charity run just outside Limerick City.

Had intended to really attack the course and try to break 55 minutes. Ended up getting a text from an old friend on Saturday night and we went out for pints in town. :P I tried to keep with the 55 minute pacers. They had 2k done in 10 minutes, which utterly burnt me out. I stopped to fix my laces and stretch my calves but never really recovered. Crossed the line on 58:48 by my watch, 59:02 by the race clock, with shin splints and a dull head. Felt very sore in places so I took it easy for a few days to let my knee and my ankle calm down again. I won't make the mistake of drinking the night before a race again.

Saturday 20th May - Half Thru The Heart - Kilnaboy/the Burren, County Clare.

A half marathon to follow up the earlier series of runs in Clare. Hopefully it becomes an annual event. Numbers were limited to 250, but there were still a few familiar faces from the Limerick Parkrun and other races in this area this year. Stayed clear of booze for the week, but wasn't fit to train at all.

I set out with two goals: 1) get a faster time than I did in Limerick, and 2) break 2:10:00. I managed to stay under 10 minutes per mile but just didn't have enough ;eft in the tank to make the most of the last 2km, which were slightly downhill. Came in at 2:10:14, four seconds faster than Limerick, but it was a tougher course so I'm still delighted.

Sad news afterwards after hearing of the passing of Michael "Curley" Cunningham. I never knew him personally, but he was an instantly recognisable face at any run in this part of the country. I'm sure I ran more races with him these last six months than without. RIP to him and condolences to anybody who knew him.

Plan for Monday, Wednesday, Thursday:

Warm-Up: 1km run <5 minutes.
Dynamic stretches and mobility work to finish off the second lap of the track.

"Circuits" x5 (10 press-ups, speed/sprint ladder (2 feet in x2, sideways left/right and back the opposite side, tangos x2, 2 feet in) short jog, 2 chin-ups on the crossbar, short sprint)

1km run <5 minutes
Cool-down: Slow jog. Stretches.

Plan for Tuesday:

Warm-up: 1km under 5 minutes. Dynamic stretches, side-steps, Cariocas, lunges, etc. for half a lap of the GAA field.

Exercise 1: Lie face-down on goal-line of GAA pitch. On signal, jump to feet and sprint to 13 metre line. (x10)

Exercise 2: Stand on goal-line. Squat with finger-tips on the line, jump to touch the crossbar (x10) and sprint to 20 metre line. 1 minute break. (x5)

Exercise 3: Fartlek stuff: run, sprint, jog, repeat.

Cool-down: Walk 50 m, jog 50 m, walk 300 m. 10 minutes of stretches (hamstrings, quads, groins, calves, back)

I really, really, REALLY want to set a new PB this Saturday.

Murph_D wrote: »

The first two of those Tues exercises seem a little GAA specific to be of maximum benefit, assuming you're concentrating on running now (or are you playing football too?)

Cheers for the feedback.

I'm not playing team sports at the moment. I took a clean break from that 12 months ago. But I do want to keep some core strength. I'll be doing the Turf Warrior challenge in Killary this coming weekend as well so crawling and climbing and carrying will all be part of that.

And I'm vain and want to keep some muscle definition up top for the summer as well. I'll be living with a cross-fitter for most of the next month so I need a head-start on the strength and speed drills before we start training together. :pac:

Murph_D wrote: »

If parkrun PB is immediate focus, you need to be running more (perhaps you are, not clear from the log if you're including everything?). Nothing fancy needed, the first priority is getting out there a few times a week and getting in the miles. Either way, best of luck.

I've been logging everything here, so you're spot on. I just haven't been running often enough. Partly due to recovery from long races, partly due to colds/flus, partly due to a mixture of depression and laziness.

I've a 5k run recorded on Runkeeper from June 2016 that took me over 33 minutes. I'm down from 30:45 on 8/1/17 to 27:05 on 27/5/17 (with a PB of 26:39 a few weeks ago). So the little bits of training I've been doing are definitely helping, but they're too inconsistent.

I signed up for the Achill Half Marathon last night so I've 32 days to prepare for that as well. I need to cut back on alcohol for the next month. Long story short, this running thing is only one piece in the puzzle of sorting my life out! :eek:

Went out for my first decent run in a fortnight this morning. I was at away for a stag last weekend so I missed the Park Run. We made up for it by doing the Turf Warrior course in Killary, then several hours of paintball on Sunday. Great exercise for the whole body, but ruined with Guinness, whiskey, gin, etc over the two nights!

I'm in Conamara now for a few weeks and my next big challenge is the Achill Half Marathon at the start of July.

Went out to run 5k but ended up doing just over 5.4. Time of 31:53. Happy enough with that. Still beating 6 minutes per kilometer despite a few lazy weeks. The last 2.5k was all up-hill as well. If I can run the lot in 30 minutes by this time next week I'll be flying it.

Parkrun 07/10/2017 : 26:05. Two PBs in a row.

Good and steady. Made 1.95km in the first 10 minutes and 1.85km in the next 10 minutes, then finished strong.

The route in UL is made up of a 1.1 km loop, followed by 3 laps of a 1.3km loop. My third lap keeps costing me time, every week, but I'm getting better at it!

Weighed myself on Tuesday. 14 stone 4.7 lbs. Spent a few days eating well and relaxing in London so probably slightly heavier than that today. Nice to be getting close to the 200lb mark again though. 188 is the target for now.

Ran my hill run in the woods today. 45:02 on the clock for the route. I'll put up the splits soon, but it's a new PB again anyway. Very close to my target of a 45 minute run for 8 miles. October could be a great month for me this year!

Edit:

| Thursday 5/10 | Sunday 15/10
KM1 |5:29 | 5:19
KM2 |6:22 | 6:09
KM3 |5:52 | 5:47
KM4 |5:09 | 4:58
KM5 |6:11 | 6:06
KM6 |5:36 | 5:46
KM7 |5:04 | 5:18
KM8 |5:49 | 5:32

Looks like kms 6 and 7 let me down a little bit after a much stronger first half. Good over all though.

Tuesday.

1) Runkeeper's "Pace Academy Challenge" - step 1: Surges. Followed the instructions of the app, but set my own pace for parts of it.

5 minute warm-up jog at 7:50 per km.
30 seconds @5:00/km pace, 2 minutes @6:20/km (x8)
5 minute cool-down jog at 7:50 per km.

Overall target was (if I've got my maths correct) 4.6km in 30 minutes. Actual distance was 5.29km in 30:30. I screwed up on my first surge and kept it going for nearly 90 seconds so my legs were tired towards the end, but still ended up getting a lot of extra work in. Also did the warm-up jog at a much faster pace.

2) Went home and did a short core workout (anyone familiar with DDP Yoga will have heard of the ~13 minute Red Hot Core routine) which served to both stretch out my legs and challenge my middle! Found it slightly easier than expected, but still very tough.

3) Had a 45 minute spinning class in the evening. A combination of steady, sprints, and high gear slogs. Brilliant exercise.

All in all, a very good day. Got a nice mixture of cardio and muscle-burning. Feels good.

Huzzah! wrote: »

I'm not sure how I'm only seeing this now but your times are very close to mine. I would say your goals are close to mine, too, but I won't be breaking 25 minutes for a 5k any time soon Best of luck with your goals. I'll be following with interest.

Thank you!

I made great progress in the spring and then got distracted and set myself back a long way.

I set a list of goals that I thought I could achieve by May. It looks now like I'll manage most of them by the end of November (my half marathon target will have to wait until 2018) but the improvement happened rapidly once I committed to running more often. I only really copped myself on in September.

It's meant that I've been too tired to perform properly at soccer training, but it'll be worth it in the long run. My weight is dropping and I've been drinking much less, so recovery time is improving too. Heading out for a short fartlek session soon. Will post again afterwards.

Insect Overlord wrote: »

And I've unlocked the next work-out in the app for tomorrow.

10 minutes slow, 10 minutes moderate, 10 minutes fast, 5 minutes walking.

I had a change of plans today, so the work-out above will have to wait until Friday.

Meant to meet some friends for an early morning out-door meditation and jog but it was cancelled at the last minute because of the weather.

Got a message from my uncle inviting me to train with him instead.

Started with a 4.7km cycle (untimed) across town to warm up. Very stop/start because of traffic lights. Pushed myself to climb the hills along the way as quickly as I could. From the meeting point it was a 2.7km cycle at a very gentle pace to the track.

From that point on it was a brick session. 10 minutes running, 10 minutes cycle, 10 minutes running, 10 minutes cycle, 10 minutes running. It wasn't an ideal track for cycling on. It was approximately 850 metres long, but narrow at each end so turning the bikes was a slow process each time. We spent a lot of time chatting about tougher workouts for proper track training. No accurate idea what distance we covered, but I'd guess somewhere around 5km jogging and 6.8km on the bikes. Nice and gentle.

Finished with a cycle home again on a different route, 6.2km (untimed). Lousy weather, but still felt good after. Over 20k on the bike and 5k of jogging is grand for one morning. Soccer training to look forward to tonight as well.

Tomorrow's challenge should be a nice bit tougher.

Might be doing a 10 mile run on Sunday depending on friends and their plans. Will worry about that later.

Kind news from my weighing scale this morning!

I'm down to 14 stone 2.2 lbs /198.2 lbs/ 89.9 kg.

I'll probably ruin that with pints this evening, but it's great to be back under 200lbs again.

Second run of the day done. Went with a little bit of speed play this time around to test my brother and see if he could match me. We managed 5.23 km in 30 minutes and a handful of seconds. Hit 5k just before the 29:00 mark.

5 minutes slow (warm-up), 2 minutes fast, 1 minute slow, 2 minutes fast, 1 minute slow, 5 minutes steady, 3 minutes slow, 6 minutes steady, 5 minutes slow (supposed to be a cool-down jog, but we pushed ourselves hard for a finish).

A very good workout indeed. Nice to have the company for this one too.

Insect Overlord wrote: »

Should be able to attack the track again tomorrow for the last workout in my training series, and then do a slow jog with the lads on Thursday morning before giving everything for 5km at parkrun on Saturday. I'll have to start aiming for 24 minutes soon.

Woke up Wednesday utterly shattered and kept telling myself I'd go for a run later, but deep down I knew it wouldn't happen.

I made up for it in style today. Met some friends at 07:30 for an early morning urban jog. We covered 6.35km in 43:40, staying with the pace of the slowest member of the group. It was nice to be able to use traffic lights as an excuse to stop for breath every now and again. And the Run/Rise idea is feeling much, much easier than the first one did on the 12th of September.

I knew I had to get through another tough session so I made myself go to the local soccer pitch again for a track workout.

Interval | Target Pace | Actual Pace
6:00 | 7:50/km | 6:13/km
6:00 | 5:20/km | 4:45/km
3:00 | 7:30/km | 6:23/km
4:00 | 5:13/km | 4:45/km
2:00 | 7:30/km | 6:33/km
2:00 | 5:07/km | 4:20/km
1:00 | 7:30/km | 7:32/km
1:00 | 5:00/km | 4:17/km
5:00 | 7:50/km | 6:22/km


Ahead of target on all but one interval, and that was my shortest recovery run between two very fast runs. Hit 5km on 27:15, got the notification that the workout was complete on 30:00, and kept going around the track until I hit 6km on 33:00. Finished with 3/4 of a lap just walking.

Fastest kilometre: #2, at 4:46 pace.
Slowest kilometre: #1, at 6:06 pace (warm-up).

Second fastest km: #4, at 5:18
Second slowest km: #6, at 5:41 (cool-down).

Came home buzzing and did 6 chin-ups just for the fun of it. Looking forward to testing myself on Saturday morning over 5k. It's been 18 days since I managed 4k in 20:00 and I've done great work since, so unless there's a total disaster at parkrun I should hit my target very soon.

Final run of October done, and it was a good one.

I want to start adding mobility exercises into my work-outs again, so I did some research this morning on things to do before and after runs as part of the warm-up and cool-down periods. The MapMyRun/Cycle/Fitness website had a few articles that included pictures and the rationale behind each exercise so I made note of two lists and factored them into my training session today.

Started with one lap around the track to get myself moving, then followed the instructions from here: http://about.mapmyfitness.com/2016/05/6-hip-mobility-exercises-for-your-pre-run-warm-up/ Most of them were familiar to me from GAA and soccer training so it was just a case of paying attention to my form and keeping count on each drill. I was using a lot of these moves back in the spring as well and I know they were effective at the time. Hopefully I'll see the benefit of adding them back in.

My main goal was to test myself for 5km on a flat course. I was confident of doing it in 25:00 but it just was not to be. I did, however, achieve a new PB of 25:07.

KM 1: 4:43
KM 2: 5:06
KM 3: 5:18
KM 4: 5:12
KM 5: 4:47

Walked the last few hundred metres back to my starting spot and cooled down with these: http://blog.mapmyrun.com/5-hip-mobility-exercises-for-your-post-run-cooldown/ Again, lots of familiar material. It won't always feel good trying to do a cool-down in bad weather conditions, but at least I got a nice day for trying things out today.

Final work-out of the month is my last spinning class tonight. My brother and I will be the only members of the squad to have attended 6/6 so we're looking forward to it.

Parkrun Limerick, Saturday 4/11/17

I knew before it started that I wasn't feeling right. I trained too hard on Thursday, again. Will have to do my sprint sessions earlier in the week from now on.

Pushed myself as hard as I could anyway and was doing okay for the first 15 minutes (2.95 km) but could do nothing to recover over the last 2k. I managed 25:33 on my own clock, and was given 25:36 on the chip. I should improve on that again next weekend if I'm sensible for the week.