"If I'm not out there training, someone else is."

Thursday AM 5 miles easy (7.21 min mile pace)
Thursday PM 3 miles easy, 6x1 mile w/ 2 min jog rec, 3 miles easy

Splits 5.42, 5.37, 5.38, 5.39, 5.38, 5.39

Nearly let laziness get the better of me this morning as put the early run off until the last minute. Legs seem to have turned a bit of a corner though with the extra bit of recovery with no evening run the day before.

Evening session was best to date in this cycle. Legs were feeling terrible at the start of the first rep. I had 5.40 in min as target pace but I was soon considering revising that to 5.45 or even 5.50, thankfully the legs soon got going and felt pretty good. Recoveries a little generous but I was happy with the effort going in. Good consistency and by the last one I was really fighting hard to maintain it. Delighted with the splits given the last few days of heavy mileage and hopefully it can lead to start of a really good training block over the coming months

After sporadic posting over the last while I am starting to come around. Got some miles in while on holidays but to be honest this was just a way of avoiding starting on the booze too early and actually seeing some of the sights (Leavensworth WA is probably one of the most scenic places I have seen between the Bavarian style architecture and the Riverside mountain town setting)

Came back and my mind was made up, Dublin is well and truly off the cards, too much d!cking about during the summer meant that I was playing catch up and would have ended up me ramping up too quickly, which would have resulted in spectacular blow up or injury.

To be honest making this decision probably lifted a weight off me as I am not chasing fitness anymore but just building it properly and slowly. Last week was just getting back to normal after what was roughly 36 hours worth of travelling between bus trips, lay overs, flights and time differences.

The Garmin was left dead as I slogged along around for a few 45 min runs with TRR, both shadows of our formers selves . Jumped into Tymon parkrun as part of a bit of a tempo for some quality in the week. Bar Krusty the race wasn't top heavy and found myself in second surprisingly in 19.04. Despite the time being a good bit slower than normal tempo pace worryingly the effort was a bit higher than what it should have been for tempo effort (signifying I do have my work cut out for me) as the detox continued

Followed on to the start of proper training

Monday AM 5 miles easy (7.29 min mile pace)
Monday PM 8 miles easy (7.33 min mile pace)

Kept these nice and handy, not feeling too bad

Tuesday AM 3 miles easy, 16*1 min hills w/90 sec rec, 3 mile easy

Had to improvise this one with the track being closed, ended up doing a gradual hill, happy enough with covering just short of 300m of these and ended up being a decent work out, was working by the last few which was exactly where I wanted to be so the effort was in the right range for sure


I have a few targets in mind now over the next few months but still pretty much up in the air until I fully think things through, won't be a marathon this side of Christmas however.

Tuesday PM 4 miles recovery (8.59 min pace)

Just flushing out the legs after the session, plodded along nice and handy completely zoned out

Wednesday 11.5 miles easy (7.25 min pace)

Met up with TbL for this to pace through his session. To be honest at this stage it's not quite a pacing job but more a visual marker task of target pace chasing him. The more these sessions progress the steadier they are for me coming to the point where it won't be long before I am no longer pacing him on my easier days but rather running sessions with him.

Solid mid length run done for me so i'll take that as the legs are slowly but surely starting to remember what consistent running feels like

40 miles and 3/3 days running so far this month. Main aim for Sept is consistency

Thursday AM 4 miles easy (7.33 min pace)
Thursday PM 3 miles easy, 4 mile tempo, 3 miles easy


Tempo: 4 miles in 23.38 (5.55 min pace)
Splits: 5.58, 5.56, 5.54, 5.50

This morning was flat out so I knew any sort of a run would be a bonus so a cheeky half hour between treatments and work. It was hot and humid so I was kinda glad it would be late by the time I got out for my session.


After work fueled by a Stew family Super Soup I set off. Cumulative fatigue has yet to kick in with regards actually being back full training so I was feeling good for this one. Aim was between 5.55-6 min and at first I was feeling this may have been a bit optimistic as took me a while to get into the swing of things but got easier as I went on. Was cruising the last two miles despite them being s tiny bit tougher in terms of loop profile (although admittedly it's a pretty flat loop overall). Finished the session feeling controlled with a bit left in the thank so it was exactly what the doctor ordered.

Friday OFF

Not a fan of days off but given that I had 70 miles as the target for the week and I was on for a +90 I said I would take it as precaution given the fact its first full training week back, took a fair bit of convincing though.

Saturday 13 miles w/ 11 steady + 45 min gym

Steady miles 11@ 6.45 min pace

Met up with DQ (given up trying to learn all his handles as he burns through them quicker than Krusty burns through training shoes) Handy enough the whole way around with the target being 6.40-6.50 for this, Majority was low 6.40s with only one outside (climbing up through Islandbridge gate around Wellington Monument. Didn't have the brekkie and I think it caught up with me as after 10 steady started to dry wretch a bit so I left it at 11 and just jogged in the last mile.

Home for food and then off to the gym. Delighted to have training done and dusted by midday and have the rest of the day to myself, if only there was a bit more sport on today to enjoy:rolleyes:

Monday 6 miles easy (7.14 min pace)

Bit of a manic start to the week. 10 hour work shift followed up with 3 hours of lectures in the evening for good measure meant I had a small window in between for a run.

Felt god awful starting out on this one and couldn't figure out why till I remembered that the nutrition hadn't been the greatest yesterday (forgot bank card at home for work shift) Just reiterates the effect your diet can have on recovery. After a half mile though was cruising and kept it nice and comfortable. Had intended on getting out again after lectures but was starving so sacrificed it for the dinner.

Another busy one today but should settle down the rest of the week so not too worried as long as I get out today

Wednesday 2 miles easy, 8 miles tempo, 2 miles easy

Tempo: 8 miles in 48.55 (6.07 mile pace)

Splits: 6.14, 6.14, 6.11, 6.08, 6.07, 6.03, 5.59, 5.54

Was supposed to do a session on the grass today and was trying to figure out how I was gonna manage it. Not a great one for morning sessions at the best of time before work and by the time work and treatments would be done for the night there wasn't enough daylight to safely do the session so I though I may have to find a different venue till I realised that my other session of the week was on Sat on the roads which also happened to be my only day off work so I just swapped them round. Amazing how common sense can very easily nearly escape you :rolleyes:

Aim for this one was 6.15ish pace and started off nice and handy feeling quite controlled, pace slowly dropped as the legs loosened out without too much effort was happy with how I was ticking on. Only when I came into the last mile did I feel I was really working but at this stage I was on a high given the effort of the pace up to that point so dug in and finished comfortably tired.