Sub 5 minute mile

Cheers Murph. I'm not under the weather though per se. The cold has cleared off at this stage.

The problem with this ailment, going on previous experience, is it could last a couple of weeks to a few months (first occurrence was in 2015 and lasted about 7 months). I know exercise is not the cause of it and resting doesn't make it dissipate any quicker, having given myself plenty of breaks in the past. My wife was blaming the black eye I got :pac:

I know what I'm fit for and won't be pushing myself until I'm fit to.

Cartman78 wrote: »

Just read the last couple of pages of your blog - interesting challenge you've set yourself and something I'm interested in once I get this fupping marathon over with :pac:

Just on your ailment/health issue - have you had your bloods checked lately?

Might be worth doing if you haven't already. Was having similar issues this time last year (getting multiple colds, tired, lethargic etc) and it turned out my thyroid had gone out of whack. It's still not 100% now to be honest but symptoms under control.

Best of luck!

Been through the health checks - although not in the last 12 months. Health screen, bloods, MRIs, a couple of trial and error meds for example for vertigo. Seen 3 different GPs, a dentist and a neurologist a couple of years back when it first presented itself. I nearly didn't get a mortgage because I honestly divulged the issue to the Mortgage Life Insurance agent, so they made sure I was given a decent MOT.

I won't go on about it here though as it's the athletics forum. I'd be happier posting in personal health.

Happy to report though I've no new sports related injuries.

Feeling close to normal again so have been trying to get back at it. I'm going to try and set out an actual plan (for the first time ever) for myself to follow for the next 3-4 weeks now that I can and see where it lands me.

A bit of backfill

Week 46

• 07 Oct - 27 minutes very easy. No distance logged Feeling a bit better than a week previously. Didn't push my luck. Finished the run and wasn't wiped out
• 08 Oct - 5 km easy - 21 minutes Encouraged from the night before I decided to do two days in a row. The run was fine but I felt no urge to push any harder than my easy pace. Just glad to be fit to plod along at all.
• 10 Oct - 4.35 km easy - 19 mins.
• 12 Oct - 4.35 km easy - 17:21. Definitely finding the strength coming back a bit.

Week 47

• 14 Oct - 6.6 km easy/moderate. 26:44 mins. Two 3.1 kms splits. [12:29,12:15]
• 15 Oct - 4.65 km steady - 18:12 The old work run. Over a minute off my hard pace but I know that's not in the legs just yet
• 16 Oct - 26 mins very easy run. No distance logged
• 18 Oct - 9 km moderate - 35:39. A go at a long run. My endurance looks to be okay. Strength almost there. Green light to get back to doing some tempo work I think. Wearing skins today so I think I was overheating a little halfway round which may have slowed me a little too, so very happy with the time.
• 19 Oct - 14 x 40 secs hard 30 secs recovery - 28 minutes running Did as many as I was fit for. The last one was almost at my house so the warm down was a very slow 5 minute jog. Delighted to be fit for these. No idea if my pace was good but the effort was. Out 5 from 7 days. A very good week by my standards.

Best of luck to the DCM runners this weekend. I've to be in the office for a a little while on Bank Holiday Monday. I should mind but I've got all those race reports to look forward to :pac:

Plan was -
Monday - Hills
Tuesday - recovery run
Wednesday - Long Run (8-10 km for me)
Thursday - rest
Friday - Intervals or some Milepace workouts
Saturday or Sunday - Medium run (3-5 km)

Week 49

• 28 Oct - 10 x 180m Hills w/ 70 sec recovery [35, 35, 35, 36, 36, 35, 35, 35, 34, 34] 2 km warm-up and 2 km cool down
• 29 Oct - 5 km recovery run - 21.5 mins
• 30 Oct - 10 km long run - 39:50 Spotted the round numbers thread in the main forum so decided to up my usual 9 km run to 10 km to see if a sub 40 was doable on my long run. Expected it to be easier going but knew I'd have to push more than I planned for the last 2 kms to nip under the time. Last 2 km were done in 3:39/km pace.
• 01 Oct - 17 x Intervals (40 secs hard with 03 secs jog)
• 03 Oct - 6.7 km easy - 28:30

Similar plan for this week

I was meant to do a MilePace workout / fitness test yesterday but had to make do with setting out this cold morning. Very glad I did.

These were the trusty old 10x400m repeats Sacksian suggested many months back (on a walking path here). I don't know why but I decided to start with a 60 second standing recovery and inevitably increase it for the latter few runs. But, to my surprise I didn't need to. These were still tough from number 5 onward, and I did contemplate increasing the recovery towards the end but stubbornness won out.

10 x 400 m at MP with 60 sec recovery [71,72,73,72,75,75,74,74,76,72]

With, many clocking in quicker than target(75) at the start, it took me a while to get my pacing right. The one blip at 76 was when I hit some traffic so could not push hard for the last 20 metres, having to run out on the grass.

I really hope this is a good sign of solid progress.

I've been wearing the same pair of € 80 Asics since around December last year, be it running on grass, road, path or track.

Do I need particular runners for the indoor?

More or less stuck to plan last week with a day slipping here and there but the main sessions were done. Motivation was a little lower for some reason but Saturdays workout gave me a nice lift.

Again, plan was -
Monday - Hills
Tuesday - recovery run
Wednesday - Long Run (8-10 km)
Thursday - rest
Friday - A Milepace workout
Saturday or Sunday - Medium run (3-5 km)

Week 51

• Monday - 10 x 185m Hills w/ 70 sec recovery [33, 35, 35, 35, 35, 36, 35, 36, 35, 33] 2 km warm-up, 2 km cool-down. Very cold night. I felt good heading out but found the going tougher than expected. A big dinner of spag bol an hour and a half before probably didn't help.
• Tuesday - Missed recovery run A common theme it seems this training block.
• Wednesday - 9 km long run - 34:32 Another cold lunchtime run. My watch was covered by skins so I didn't check any waypoint times along the route, taking it nice and comfortable. Then I couldn't resist and checked with around 3 km to go. I was trying to just focus on consistent form and cadence but ended up picking up for the last km. Very pleased with the time which is a record for this route by 5 seconds without being at full tilt. The wind direction was also unfavourable today. Average pace of: 03:43/km with last 3 kms in 03:45/km so nice consistency.
• Thursday - 4.5 km v easy run - 21 mins Supposed to be rest but had to make up for missing Tuesday.
• Friday - Pushed session back a day
• Saturday - 10 x 400 m with 60 seconds standing recovery [71, 72, 73, 72, 75, 75, 74, 74, 76, 72] Reported already. Out on Saturday morning, the extra days rest probably helped the energy levels here.
• Sunday - 3.5 km moderate run : 13:38 Legs more tired than I realised from the day before.

That was week 51 so I'll probably be doing a mile run myself on the road before racing on December 3rd. You never know... Currently have a mild throat infection so we'll see how that plays out.

The structure of the previous month has slowly fallen apart. :rolleyes:

On a positive note I've been getting consistent kms in just not the sessions. I had planned on tapering a little during the week past anyway before running the indoor mile race this week. And I did manage to do that but my days were all jumbled up as I found myself on the road with work a little bit.

I won't even write what the plan was as I ended up doing what I felt like on each day.

Also, no mile attempt, for the 1 year anniversary, as my trusty route was flooded the couple of days I was in the office so I decided I'd have to save myself the drama for the following week.


Week 53

• Monday - 9 km long run - 34:37 Began by making up for missing my long run from the previous week and to sweat the remainder of the weekends beer out of me. Was aiming for sub 35. Got there, with a little more effort than I would have liked towards the end.
• Tuesday - 6 km easy - 23:42 New runners. Legs tired from yesterday, which wasn't too surprising.
• Wednesday - Rest
• Thursday - 8 x 185 m Hills w/ 70 sec recovery [32, 34, 33, 34, 33, 33, 35, 33] 2 km warm-up, 2 km cool-down. Attempt at tapering here so did 8 instead of the usual 10. So I ended up running these a little harder than normal. My average time turned out to be just over a second faster than my usual average time for 10 of these. Done at 9:30 pm after a daily round trip to Wexford.
• Friday - 5 km v easy - 25 mins Caught a little chill after the night before I think. Not helped by the fact I had some ice cream before jumping in the shower as I was waiting for the bathroom to be vacated :pac: . So I set off on this very easy. My left foot arch was sore setting out.
• Sunday - 3 x 4 minute tempos with 2 mins slow in between. 6.7 km in 28 mins. The end to an ill disciplined week. I'd intended on tapering by doing a lower volume of reps on my regular interval workout but didn't get any Intervals or MP workouts this week either. 10 pm getting out here and it was cold so settled for some tempo work to keep some sharpness in the legs before hopefully my mile attempt in a couple of days. Arch was sore setting out again and afterwards once I warmed down.

So I've got a sore arch on my left foot. I'm not sure it's down to the new runners which I wore on and off last week. I had started feeling it a little bit the week before without it being actually sore. It hurts a little to walk now and when setting out running but is not sore once warmed up and going.

Tomorrow's NIA is in sight now. I think the arch will hold up for a blast at it as long as parental duties don't intervene. Have spent a bit of time rolling a golf ball under it and will keep at that into tomorrow. If it does and I make the race I might give it a rest for a week or so, whether I get under the 5 or not.

5:02 - PB

No official time seen for this yet but that's what my watch tells me. My instinctive response was disappointment to only gain 4 seconds since my last track run during the summer. I thought I'd put the work in, albeit with a non-ideal last 2 weeks. But then on the drive home I realised I haven't been following a validated plan and shouldn't be too harsh on myself. I was coughing all the way home too and until I went to bed. That's some very dry air in the arena.

The Race
There was a bit of confusion about heats and who went where. I was due to run in the second heat but saw they were letting folks run in either. I was going to jump into the first heat as well, when the steward asked my name and said I should wait for the second. I might have set the bar too high for myself with the online entry putting in what my PB was as I could tell I was in with some serious runners. I was the only one sporting Asics, the rest were all in their spikes.
I took my start place on the outside, expecting most to tear off past me into the first bend.

Laps 1/2 - 1:12 (split 72)
The sprint to the first bend wasn't as intense as I expected and I found myself ahead of 3 or 4. It was all fairly bunched and I was sitting on the outside of another runner for the first lap. Falling in behind him during the second. Went through 3 seconds up, thinking "feic Ive gone out too fast again".

Laps 3/4 - 2:30 (split 78)
I let a little gap open up to the guy in front and was duly passed by two runners. I think I was passed by the final guy on the final bend of lap 4. Crossed the line on time so no panicking.

Laps 5/6 - 3:48 (split 78)
Isolated, running my own race in last place here I felt I was cruising a little. I'd decided before the race I'd only check the clock every second lap as there would be too many numbers for me to be remembering. It might have helped here if I knew where I was supposed to be, but I should have realised that although the midway split was on time, my 2nd quarter was off by 3 seconds so I should have picked it up again a little during this which I didn't.

Laps 7/8 - 5:02 (split 74)
I saw the clock at 4:48 as the announcer was saying 2 laps to go for me shortly followed by 1 lap to go for the lead runner so I knew he was bearing down on me. I blanked on what 4:48 implied for my target by was always going to dig in with the 2 laps left. I was lapped on the home straight of lap 5, stepping out to let the guy by. This might have cot me a second. Once he crossed the clock was stopped at 4:28, I passed a second or 2 later so I knew I'd need a 30 second final 200. No idea if I had that in me or not but I put the boot down as hard as I could. The runner in second last place had been about 30 metres ahead of me before lap two. I finished about 3 metres behind him so the benefit of chasing someone helped for sure.

The middle of the race looks to have been my undoing again. That said I wonder if I pushed harder then would I have any kick left for the final lap. When I crossed the finish line I'd nothing left. I actually thought I might have sneaked it so viewing my watch for the first time at the end was disappointing. 150 versus 152 for the two halves. Should I be looking at negative splitting or going out hard and trying to hold on.

I ended up googling this last night. It's happened a few times during hard runs this year and came back again last night. Leaking air sacs maybe
https://www.outsideonline.com/2401802/how-stick-new-training-plan