Barca bound...

Week 18 Marathon plan 3/03/24

Mon – 40 mins fast finish, last 10 mins zone 3 (4.82m/HR141/8:18p/m) Perhaps went a bit quick for the easy pace segment, but really felt good on this run overall. 7:09 p/m for zone 3 bit.

Tues – 30 mins easy (3.36m/HR135/8:56p/m). Loop around docklands, windy and wet.

Wed – 30 mins easy (3.4m/HR134/8:48p/m) Reverse of the same docklands loop as the previous day, dry and crisp.

Thurs – 31 mins, short zone 4 intervals (10 min warm up, 4 x (2min Z4/2min Z1), 5 min cool down). (3.6m/HR145/8:43p/m) Last run in the plan! Usual pacing of the zone 4 segments – just around 5k pace, but didn’t overdo it.

Overall legs feeling ok, sleep going ok so far as well and not noticing any change in resting HR or HRV (compared to the mini taper I did a few weeks back for my last 20 miler where they jumped up a bit).  I’m travelling tomorrow and doing a 20 min run on Sat as my last bit of race prep – will get stuck into some carbs in the meantime. Reflecting on the block I’m happy that I kept the consistency up, I moved some sessions around but managed to run 6 days a week the whole way through. Having a long lead in to the actual plan starting in Nov (running 6 days per week since last August) definitely worked for me to get my legs ready for running higher mileage than I’ve ever done. So we’ll see where it takes me on Sunday – will try and do a repeat of the simulation run I did a few weeks back, see how I’m fixed after 16 miles and take it from there. Best of luck to anyone else on here running it!

Weekly mileage 15.2 (2hrs 31 mins, 19min (13%) above zone 2) 

Barcelona Race weekend

So myself and my family flew over Friday night, I’d booked an airbnb last year just off passeig de gracia, which was less than 10 mins walk to the start line at placa catalunya, it made for a very hassle free race morning. Slept terrible on the Friday night (only 4.5 hrs), but managed to keep Saturday a relaxing day, I went to the expo and then went home to get some power naps in, I left my wife and my two girls to go off to the montjuc cable car and they got in a bit of shopping after on the way home. I’d seen Barcelona a good bit before and it rained the entire day on Saturday so I didn’t feel like I was missing much! Pre-race meal was mid-afternoon pizza (sartoria panatieri which I can recommend) which did the job with some tasty carbs. Anyway thankfully I got a decent kip Saturday night and woke up very positive on Sun morning, got the toilet situation sorted early (oddly obsessed by this) and was just a bundle of nervous energy from that point on. Left the apartment at 7:45am and were down at the start before 8, bit of a warm up run and dynamic stretches and into the coral about 8.20, for start time of 8:35. I had booked into the 3.45-4hr wave when I originally signed up last August, and I’d since sent an email to change my wave to 3.15-3.30 but they had no record of me making the change request when I collected my bib, but the very helpful admin staff sorted that out at the expo without any problem. As it happened they weren’t checking bibs too closely at the wave entrance anyway.

Miles 1-5 (8:22,8:22,8:07,8:05,8:01 – total 40:57) HR avg 155

So with my only big scale race prior to this being Dublin in 2011 it had been a long time since I’d had any experience like this, really great atmosphere at the start, a few singers belting out Barcelona before each wave started off, just a great buzz around the place. Set myself at the back of the wave and away we went, perfect blue skies and temp about 9 degrees. I mentioned my intention to follow the pacers in my last update – they weren’t in this wave as it turned out, they were at the top of the 3.30-3.45 one so I didn’t see them until they passed me later (but not that much later!) in the race. Anyway my first couple of miles were a bit ropey to say the least – my legs just felt heavy and thinking back to the simulator run I’d done a few weeks ago (which I did fair bit!), while that session felt Iike I was cruising through the miles, this did not! So took the first couple of miles handy and then got closer to what I’d hoped would be race pace by the end of the first 5 miles. Small bit of a long slow hill after the first mile in there also, about 50 feet of elevation gain.

Mile 6-10 (7:57,8:18,7:54,7:56,7:55 – total 40:00) HR avg 159

It was during this stretch that the 3.30 pacers caught up with me, around mile 7. Their arrival coincided with a some very gradual uphill bits, but in the race I didn’t really notice any incline, just tried to lock in with the back of the pace group and see how I went. Again looking back at it after the fact, my HR at this point in the race was already higher than my average for the entire 16 miles in the simulator run (155)…mmm, not too promising. My watch was giving me an estimated finish time of 3hrs 33 or something at this stage I think. But I was really enjoying it – saw my wife and kids twice during the first 10 miles which was great, and the crowds in general were really good on some of the narrower roads in particular. But there weren’t many barriers so pedestrians were regularly just crossing the road at times during the race – saw some near misses with runners on a good few occasions in this section.  

Mile 11-15 (7:41,7:55, 7:54, 7:52, 7:59 – total 39:21) avg HR 161

This stretch went back down past the start line, all on a slight downhill so paces reflected that (100 feet of elevation drop in this section). This course is is really flat once you hit mile 15, and from then to mile 25 its almost completely flat. Some good crowds in this part too. I’m feeling ok at this point, but by the end of this stretch I’m a good bit behind the 3.30 pacers and I’m not really sure if catching them is feasible.

Mile 16-20 (8:12, 8:10, 8:20, 8:13, 8:17 – total 41:13) avg HR 166

Here’s where the sun started to make its presence felt, this bit of the course skirts the bottom of la ramblas, goes past parc de la ciutadella and then out towards the massive convention centre and diagonal mar. So the sun was properly up and there was no shade whatsoever for this bit – I think the forecast had it for about 16 degrees but it felt hotter to me. Here’s where in my pre-race wisdom I’d said – I’ll do 16 miles and see where I’m at, thinking about perhaps pushing on at this point if things went well. So while looking back on it, I actually covered the first 16 miles of the marathon in a very similar time (only 30 seconds in the difference) to the simulator run 3 weeks ago, the effort levels did not feel any way similar and I’d had to work a lot harder. My breathing was fine but my legs were getting heavier, and I was consciously slowing the pace a bit to reflect that. At this stage I was just thinking could I sneak 3.35 perhaps.

Mile 21-25 (8:29, 8:22, 8:35, 8:35, 8:44 – total 42:45) avg HR 165

I had made a conscious effort to run the race with a smile on my face (clichéd as that sounds), and I’d managed this fairly well I think up till mile 20, but from then but from here on the smile became a grimace. Here’s also where the devil on my shoulder was saying “what harm would walking do, give yourself a break”. Whatever else I was thinking about goals etc. I really, really, really wanted to just run the whole thing this time around, so I kept plodding on and ignoring this inner voice as best I could. I had walked/hobbled a good 8 miles of the Dublin 2011 marathon with a dodgy knee (caused in part by dodgy pacing!) so I really didn’t want to go down that road. Plus the way my right hip had tightened up by this point I wasn’t so sure I would get going again easily! So this bit really felt like me just putting one leg in front of the other – there was a long straight around the 22 mile mark that felt like it would never end. I’d been taking precision fuel gels all the way around, along with their electrolyte tablets (planning for 6 gels during the race). But I’d got through them all at this point and so I tried one of the race gels (finisher it was called, wouldn’t be rushing back for another but no ill effects from it thankfully). I also missed seeing my family at the 25 mile mark – we’d planned a few points to meet but this wasn’t one of them so I wasn’t watching out for them – they had tracked me on the app but only saw the back of me as I shuffled past. I wish my wife had a pedometer on the kids for the day, they were fairly marched around the city trying to see me!

Mile 26 + the finish (8:34, 3:51 for the “bit” which turned out to be .52 miles!) avg HR 170

The support was fantastic the last couple of miles but the crowd were really encroaching on the road at times – I think at one point there was so many people that there was only room for 3-4 runners to run abreast and with some of the runners stopping to walk etc there was a little bit of dodging to do at times. This got bad at one particular patch with a mile to go, but there were barriers up from then on. Anyway once I hit 26 miles on the watch I tried to get the legs moving a bit faster – think I clocked 7:10 per mile pace for the last half mile. And close to the end I looked at my watch and it had my estimated finish time at 3.37 so I just said lets try and beat that and put it a bit of a spurt on for the last 200 metres, under the arc de triomf and over the line for a chip time of 3:36:33 (3:36:41 on my garmin). So got my medal, had a very sweaty hug with the family and walked around a bit to get my hips to start working again, which they did eventually.

 Total distance (garmin) 26.52/HR162/8.10p/m

So that is my second marathon done, over 12 years after the first one. A lot of positives to take from it despite feeling flat on race day, still curious about that thinking back on it but I was happy that I kept plugging away in the circumstances. The other side of it is I’ve probably never been fitter, I got through the block and race injury free and I’ve got a stronger running base to build on for whatever’s ahead.

Anyway thanks to anyone who’s taken the time to read this, really good and positive running community on here which is part of the reason why I started logging. We’ll see what is next, no running for a couple of weeks and then over the next year or so I think a 5k and a half marathon will be put in the diary.

Thanks very much, and agree on the rain - I couldn't help but watch the weather forecast all week in the build up but thankfully the rain on Sat didn't follow us till Sunday! Hope you had a good race yourself!

Thanks @[Deleted User], on the timing/targets side I suppose the first few miles of a marathon should ideally feel like you are holding yourself back a bit, when I didn't have that feeling on the day I just kind of mentally parked my goal and got over it. I still tried to run my paces because you never know unless you try (looking at it objectively this was perhaps to my detriment in the second half of the race). And on the many things that could go really wrong, I agree, getting through without any disasters makes me reflect well on the whole thing and I'm proud of the run overall.

Anyway the feet are up for now, as of today I can climb a stairs without looking like a 90 year old, so onwards and upwards!

Week 1 - 5k plan

So its been a while since I posted here but I’ve just done week 1 of a 5k plan so I thought it would be good to start logging again. The plan I’m doing is the 80/20 intermediate level plan(bought it off trainingpeaks) – weekly mileage of 30-40 miles and I’ll mostly be running 6 days per week with speedwork on Mondays and Thursdays and most of the other days easy running. The plan has a load of speed sessions that I’ve not done before - Lactate intervals, MAS intervals, Tempo intervals in a long run and 5 and 10k paced intervals towards the end, so I’m looking forward to seeing how it goes.

In terms of recent running, I’m back doing 5 days a week since early April and for the month in total I ran 128 miles (mostly easy) and as of today in May I’ve done 99 miles. I did a bit of speedwork here and there but it was a good 4/5 weeks after the marathon in March before I really felt the legs were up to it. But I think in terms of holding on to marathon fitness I’ve done ok – Vo2 max is trending back up and my easy run pace (at a similar heart rate) is now around a minute per mile quicker than it was last summer, so definite progress has been made. Most enjoyable (scenery wise) but challenging running I’ve done in the last while was a trip over to the UK a couple of weeks back where we went camping in the costwolds for a few nights, every run there involved long hills and plenty of them. Runalyse has a “Percentage hilly” score for a run in their metrics – so every cotswolds run was 40%-50% hills when at home on my regular running routes its at worst 5-7% so it was a bit of a shock to the system. Would be very interesting to see how you’d go doing an entire marathon training block with hills like that!

Anyway for the week just gone I did:

Mon - 46 mins Fartlek – 15 mins warm up, then 8x (20 sec zone 5/1:40 zone 1), 15 min cool down. (4.87 miles/HR140/9:27p/m). Maybe went a little quick on the zone 5 segments, not meant to be all out sprints but I kind of treated them like it, but overall session itself was fine.

Tues - 40 mins easy (4.3 miles/HR 138/9:16 p/m) legs a little stiff from the previous day so kept this on the slower side.

Wed – 60 mins easy (6.9miles/HR140/8:44p/m) – nice early morning run down home before heading to Dublin, always like running early but the early morning sunshine (when its there!) makes it even better.

Thurs - 45 mins fast finish, last 5 mins at CV pace (low zone 4 is what was prescribed, in between 5k/10k pace). (5.25 miles/HR139/8:33p/m). So guesstimating a little at paces ran the last segment at 6.40 p/m, felt pretty good. Wore brooks hyperion max for this, a shoe which I’m enjoying for this kind of session. My speedwork shoe for my last block was the reebok floatride 5 (now relegated to daily use) but I’ve since upgraded to the brooks and a pair Adidas adizero adios 8 as my speedwork rotation. Probably Certainly unnecessary to have both but I find it very difficult to pass up a running shoe bargain, they were both around €100 and are nice and light.

Fri – 70 mins easy (7.8 miles/HR139/8:59 p/m) Switched this run to Friday instead of Saturday as out for drinks that night and wanted to have this out of the way. Light drizzle but nothing too serious

Sat – 40 mins easy (4.4miles/HR140/9:01pm) got out to do this reasonably early while I still had the energy, had a terrible sleep even though I only had a couple of drinks. Good to have the first week done, will be similar mileage for the next 6 weeks or so and the plan is 9 weeks long.

Miles for the week: 33.5, ytd 684

Week 2

Mon, no running, the plan had short hill sprints but I played golf instead. Was thinking of trying to get this run in later in the day but ended up cutting up most of a tree that had been taken down at home, so did not have the energy for it after that! I’d normally try and rejig the week and get the speedwork done somewhere else but as I was travelling for work I just let it go, I got in every other session so not I’m ok with that.

Tues - 50 mins easy (5.6miles/HR138/8:54p/m). Down home for this, nothing much to report.

Wed - 60 mins easy (6.7 miles/HR140/8:57p/m). Over in Frankfurt for work, nice run along the river.

Thurs 49 mins – progression (30 mins Z1/Z2 then (8 mins SSP/4 mins Threshold/2 mins CV) 5 mins Z1) (5.7miles/HR142/8:24p/m). Nice morning in Frankfurt for this again, a little on the warm side though. Paces for the progression are guided at 2hr pace/1hr race pace/30 min race pace. Went ok I think, had done this once before and got similar enough paces this time around.

Fri – 40 mins easy (4.5miles/HR138/8:50p/m). Had limited sleep after a combination of a flight delay and returning to the airport carpark to a car with a dead battery (completely my fault), exactly the end to a work trip that you do not want! Got a jump start thanks to airport parking support but was only home at 2am. Run did not seem affected by this thankfully, lack of sleep caught up with me later in the day though.

Sat 1hr 20 mins easy - (9.1miles/HR141/8:47p/m). Longest run I’ve done in a while, did a nice loop along some very quiet country roads, very enjoyable. Next week has some runs I’ve not done (MAS intervals), some more CV pace intervals and some tempo segments in the long run so will see how that goes..

Weekly mileage 31.7 (4hrs 39min with 15mins (5%) above zone 2)

Week 4

Mon - Lactate intervals (6.2 miles/HR147/8:42 p/m)

5:00 in Zone 1/10:00 in Zone 2
8 x 0:30 in Zone 4/0:15 in Zone 1, 3:00 in Zone 1
8 x 0:30 in Zone 4/0:15 in Zone 1, 3:00 in Zone 1
8 x 0:30 in Zone 4/0:15 in Zone 1. 15:00 in Zone 1

Another session I’ve not done before – short zone 4 efforts and v short recoveries. Wanted to get HR up over 170 which I did by the 2nd and 3rd set of reps.

Tues - 60 mins easy (6.9 miles/HR139/8:40p/m) – nice run up around docklands/sandymount

Wed no running, skipped a 45 min easy run in favour of starting and finishing work early and golfing in the afternoon, slight bit of guilt to miss a planned run but once I’m not missing the speedwork I’m ok with it.

Thurs - 57mins (Over/under intervals) (6.9 miles/HR145/8:17p/m)

15 min warm up (Z1/2), 3 x (3:00 in Zone 3/4:00 in Zone Y/2:00 in Z1), 15:00 in Z1

Another new one for me. Zone Y classified as between Z3 and Z4, so picked up the pace a small bit for these, probably around 10k pace. Did this very early before going to Dublin but felt pretty good overall during this.

Fri - 45 mins easy (5 miles/HR138/9:01p/m)

Sat - 65 mins Steady run (7.8 miles/HR146/8:18p/m)5:00 in Zone 1/10:00 in Zone 2, 35:00 in Zone X, 15:00 in Zone 1.Slightly longer zone x (between half and marathon pace) segment than I did a few weeks back, did this down in portlaoise. Went fairly well I think, avg pace was 7:37 per mile for the steady segment.

I’ve been looking around for a suitable 5k race to finish off the block with, I was just going to do a park run in Mullingar if nothing came up but I spotted (on www.popupraces.ie) the “streets of athboy 5k” on the Friday 2nd August. Its less than 10 mins from home so will give it a go, will have an extra week’s training to come up with to stretch out the 9 week block a bit but can repeat a session or two.

Weekly mileage 32.8 (4hrs 44min with 1hr6mins (23%) above zone 2)

Week 7

Sat – 65mins with 35 mins steady pace segment. (8 miles/HR 145/8:06p/m).

Same run I did in portlaoise a couple of weeks ago, did an out and back route at home this time.

Really enjoyed this and felt very fresh after a couple of days off.

Mon Variable intensity intervals (6.9 miles/HR149/8:20p/m)

15 min warm up, 4 x (4 x 0:30 @ MAS/0:45 @ LTP/zone 3)/2:30 in Zone 1,15min cool down

Same session as last monday, again found this tough but this was of my own makings this time. Wasn’t looking at my watch so unintentionally paced the quickest segments a bit too fast (around 5:30p/m), this caught up with me in the zone 3 “recovery” segments where my pace dropped a good bit towards the end of the session. But kept the fast bits consistent at least, perhaps more by accident than by design but pacing was in the same range for all of them.

Tues 40 mins easy (4.2 miles/HR133/9:39p/m)kept this as a shorter recovery effort (nothing to do with the lashing rain!), but had a bit of a groin twinge after it, not something that I’ve gotten before.

Wed – planned 60 mins easy but skipped it just to be on the safe side, postponed planned tempo run from Thurs to Sat to see how I got on with some easy runs first.

Thurs 50 mins easy (5.7 miles/HR140/8:44p/m), Fri 60 mins easy (6.7 miles/HR137/8:57p/m)

Both these runs went fine, no groin flare up so all good hopefully

Sat – 1hr 7mins, Tempo intervals (8.1 miles/HR149/8:17p/m)

15min warm up, 16 mins Zone 3/5 mins Z1/16 mins Zone 3, 15min cool down. Another new run for me, nice change of pace and it went quite well. Avg pace of 7:12 p/m for both the zone 3 segments, HR low 160s for the first rep, up to avg of 167 for the second 16 min block.

Weekly mileage 31.6 (4hrs 34min with 53mins (19%) above zone 2)

Week 9

Mon 40 mins easy (4.3 miles/HR126/9:14p/m) Tues 50 mins easy (5.8 miles/HR140/8:41p/m)

Mon run more of a recovery effort after 10k reps previous day, picked up the pace a bit on Tues.

Wed 5k repeats 15 min warm up, 5 x (1km @ 5k race pace/2 min rec), 15 min cool down.

This was hard, but I guess that was the point! So I paced the 1k reps towards the top end of what runalyze estimates my potential 5k pace at (just under 19 mins – 3:46 per/km). and it felt like this pace was a bit on the aggressive side. First two reps I felt heavy legged, 3rd rep felt ok, 4th was slightly worse and for the last rep I was just hanging on. 1km splits were 3:50,3:48,3:51,3:50,3:50 so consistent at least. Recoveries reps were down as jogging – but I did a mix of walking and jogging, 30 seconds walking – 90 seconds light jogging for the last 2 recoveries anyway. So not entirely sure what to take from this, 5k effort should of course be hard but don’t know how or if these session paces will translate to a race. Anyway last significant speed session of the plan done, will have another think about race pacing but leaning towards 19:30 perhaps as a more realistic target now after this.

Thurs 40 mins easy (4.4miles/HR132/9:00 p/m) Fri 50 mins easy (5.9miles/HR139/8:30 p/m)

Sat – zone 3 fast finish run (65 mins with last 10 mins zone 3) (7.9 miles/HR140/8:13p/m)

Wet morning for this, thank you Irish “summer”, but enjoyed the run nonetheless, 7 mins per mile for the last 10 mins, HR avg 163 for this bit. Unfortunately covid has arrived back in the house also, not too bad a dose but my wife and older daughter have it while my younger daughter and I are waiting to get it – would very much like it if it could pass me by this time somehow with the race coming up but we’ll see!

Weekly mileage 35.2 miles (5hrs 06min with 33mns (11%) above zone 2)

So been a while since I posted but just to give a short update on the last few months, and then update the log for where I’m at now (in week 5 of the hansons half marathon plan). So August was a great months running, got in a good few runs when I was on holidays in France, and generally felt in great shape (132 miles total for the month). Bit of a backward step then in September, got a calf strain running up the beach at the end of my holiday which I’m sure was comical for onlookers, meant I could run easy but could not do any speedwork, so took some time off after this. Then kids back to school, first bad head cold of the season and then a stomach bug went through the house, so this led to more days off running, bitty kind of month overall (100 miles in total). October was better, got back running up to 6 days per week, bit of speedwork here and there but mostly easy runs, and a few longer runs (9/10 miles or so) mixed in. (134 miles for the month).

And since the start of November I’ve been back doing a formal training plan, the hansons advanced half marathon plan – which is 18 weeks, to line up with the Mullingar half marathon in March 2025. So Hansons is fairly straightforward (on paper!), the plan has speed/strength work once a week and then tempo runs (3-7 miles at target half marathon pace) being the other session. Speedwork is 400-1200 metre reps (close to 5k of pace work usually) at around 5k pace for the first 10 weeks of the plan, and for the last 8 weeks these are replaced by “strength” running sessions, reps of between 1 and 3 miles at 10 seconds quicker than target HM pace. The remainder of the week is 3 days of easy running and then a long run which starts off around 7 miles in the early weeks, up to a max of 14 miles.

I’m doing the advanced version of the plan – it maxes out at around 50 miles per week which a similar mileage to the peak weeks in my marathon block earlier in the year, so hopefully should be doable. I’ve gone through the “Hansons Half marathon method” book and I’ve set my week up so that my speed/strength sessions are Monday, day off is Wednesday, Tempo runs are Thursday and my long runs will be on Saturday. This is a slight change from the plan (an extra day in between the speedwork days) but the suggestion in the book is that its ok to change once you are then consistent with the change. I’m making the adjustment as Mondays and Thursdays are days I can almost always commit to (and will usually be wfh), and when the plan ramps up after christmas I’ll be doing 9 or 10 miles on both of those days so will be a big enough commitment.

Week 5 - 8/12/24

Sun 7 miles easy (8:48p/m, HR 141). Added a couple extra miles to this run as I didn’t run the day before and I was aiming to add on some easy miles to most runs this week as the Saturday long run would have to be cut down a bit.

Mon – (1.5 mile warm up, 5x1k @5k pace off 600m recovery, 1.5 cool down). 1hr 08 mins, HR 149. Targeted 4 mins for the 1k reps and was on track with 4:01, 4:00, 4:02, 3:58, 3:56. Went ok, last recovery interval went a little long without realising but happy enough with this overall.

Tues 6 miles easy (8:45p/m, HR139) – usual docklands/sandymount loop for this, lovely crisp morning for it.

Thurs – 7 miles with 4@HM pace (7:55p/m, HR 149). HM pace miles were 7:10,7:13,7:09,7:09 and felt pretty good (compared to when I ran similar paces 2 weeks ago), HR was in line with where I’d hope for too (around 160) which was good to see.

Fri – 6 miles easy (8:52p/m, HR137) nothing much to report

Sat – 5 miles easy (8:57p/m, HR134), kept this fairly easy, was meant to be a 10 mile run but I had spread the planned weekly mileage out earlier in the week and so I still ended up just 1 mile short of planned mileage for the week. Was heading to Dublin for lunch and drinks after this so didn’t fancy turning up knackered.

Weekly mileage 39, (15% above HR Z2)

Week 6 - 15/12/24

Sun – 4.5 miles easy (8:55p/m, HR 141). slight hangover was easing off by the time I did this, but just about had the energy to get out for a short run, overall glad I did in the end.

Mon - 4x1200m off 600m recovery. 1hr 2 mins, HR 151) Last rep felt hard, and looking back I ran the first few recoveries a bit quick (quite a bit quicker than during my 5x1km last week) so this perhaps contributed. But splits for the 1200m reps were around what I was aiming for – 4:50, 4:49, 4:44, 4:52.

Tues – 6.5 miles easy (8:41p/m, HR140)

Thurs 7 miles with 4@HM pace (7:59p/m, HR150) HM paced splits were 7:12, 7:10,7:05,7:11 and felt comfortable enough at that too. Enjoying these HM paced runs for now, will see how it goes when I’m doing 7 miles at HM pace later in the plan though!

Fri – 6 miles easy (8:35p/m, HR136) very early morning run, head torch on for this one.

Sat – 12 miles easy (8:57p/m, HR141) Longest run I’ve done in about 6 months, about half of this was into a fairly stiff breeze and while HR was fine my legs definitely felt heavy.

Weekly mileage 43, (15% above HR Z2)

Week 9 – 6/01/2025

Sun – 5 miles easy (8:43p/m, HR139). Was expecting to wake up to snow but thankfully not, just a bit of light rain during this run.

Mon –7.5miles (1.5m warm up, 6 x 800m with 400m recovery, 1.5m cool down). (8:24 p/m, HR 149) Warmed up in puma magnify nitro 2, and while there were some icy spots the grip levels on the road didn’t feel too bad. Then tried my old endorphin pro 3 for the first of the 800s and basically felt like I was ice skating, no grip at all. So stopped and switched to boston 12s and grip was better but not great. Splits for the 800s were 3:13, 3:09, 3:10, 3:08, 3:09, 3:15 so happy with that (target for splits would be 3:10-3:15) considering the conditions, but it was hard work at times with slippy patches of road. Also I think that at these paces the bostons felt a bit clunky (would normally wear adios 8 for these runs), they feel better suited to half marathon pace for me at least.

Tues 6 miles easy (8:39p/m, HR137)

Thurs - 8 miles with 5@HM pace (7:57p/m, HR156)Least successful run of the plan so far, mile splits for the tempo were ok (7:14, 7:11, 7:07, 7:13, 7:08 – in the range I’ve been doing for these runs) but effort level and HR were too high during the tempo segment, up near threshold for the last mile and this definitely did not seem like a sustainable effort for another 8 miles! But I’ve ran paces in the range of 7:05-7:15 for most of the tempo runs so far and they have felt “comfortably hard”, so not sure why this particular run was different. Anyway will see how next week’s effort at this goes.

Fri - 5 miles easy (8:36p/m, HR142) Very early run this morning before heading to Dublin for work, no real ice about thankfully

Sat 10 miles easy (8:27 p/m, HR143) Omens were not good for this run, only had 5hrs sleep after being a bit late coming back from dinner at friends house the night before. But somehow this run went great, a bit of misty rain about but ran the whole 10 miles at the quick end of the suggested easy run pace and felt comfortable all the way, very nice way to finish off the week. Boston 12s perfect for this run also, softening up nicely the more miles I’ve put into them.

Weekly mileage 41.5 (17% above HR Z2)