Sub 31:35

shels4ever

WEll i've decided to log my winter training here , to include my mileage and interval training for the winter.

My aim is to get my 5 mile time down to sub 37 mins from 49 by the end of Feb'09. This will be a 13 min drop over a year. I've been in training since march this year is my first iserious training in 12 years.

Session is sets of 800m with 3 mins recovery.

Week 1 Total mileage = 24
Interval session

Session is sets of 800m with hills with 3 mins recovery.

1 3:59
2 3:52
3. 3:54
4. 3:56

Didnt feel good at all, legs were hurting on the 4th interval.

shels4ever

Week 2 miles this week = will update at end of week

Session is sets of 800m with 3 mins recovery.
1 3:46
2 3:38
3. 3:37
4. 3:45

Felt tired but strong at the start of the session, Running form felt a lot better this week, stronger stride and seems to have more power.
Suffered on the 4th interval and the hill killed me , but managed to keep going...

2 more week of this then I will add another interval.

showry

best of luck with it shels,
just you - not your team mind, blues to go up,

it's good to have a target, if you put the work in you'll get there

sobriquet

Good stuff shels, best of luck. You seem to have a habit of asking running related questions that I find fierce useful, we seem to be at about the same level, if I'm not being too presumptuous.

On your goal: I got my 8k time from 46:41 to 37:46 last year to this (both the Streets of Galway), mostly from the work I did since the start of the summer - 4/5 days a week, intervals, tempos, long runs etc. Not even with much consistency as you can read in my log. Given the training you've done and the time till Feb you'll destroy that target.

Woddle

Best of luck Shels, will ook forward to seeing what type of training you do and hopefully pick up a tip or 2

SUNGOD

best of luck shels with your training and your log ..........but as showry said hopefully the blues will pip shels to the post!!!!!!!!

shels4ever

Cheers, I know i'm on track for it at the moment, but not taking the foot of the gas now.. The more I beat it by the better then i'll set new targets..

Weight has come down a lot too but still work to be done there... Sub 30 mins will be the target once i get back to the 33-34 range.. so lots of hard work to come.

Cross country season starts for me on the 18th this should help me also..

shels4ever

Well rest day today, for some reason I feel guilty on my rest days now.. need to find something else to do on these days...

Racing Flat

About time you got started with one of these! Best of luck.

shels4ever

Cheers had a read of your marathon log and its pure class, inspiration to the rest of us here...


Todays run didnt go so well it was an easy 7 mile run, hard enough circut but nice , Wind didn't help today but the body was just not with it.

Enegry levels were good but the legs just didnt seem to be there today, maybe a bit of a lag from the 800m intervals on thursday maybe ran them a few seconds too fast.

2 week to my first Cross country race in years and I cant wait.. Spikes will be brough on a test run tomorrow ..

shels4ever

Well end of week 2 now and finished up with my long(ish) run 9 miles all on grass around the pheonix park.. taking in a few hils.

I have been feeling tired all week maybe the new schedule taking its tole so wasn't really looking forward to this run today.

Plan was for an easy paced run and just getting around the distance. Started out slow for the first mile and was feeling very sluggish , This kept up for mile 2, 3 . I was running my normal grass route in the park and was expecting to find it hard once i hit the hill at the 4 mile mark, but once I got to them I was starting to come around and feel better, Go through the first lap and was not feeling better then when I started.

Second lap went very well, actually had to force myself to slow down on a couple of sections, I really must stop running races in my mind during training runs.. But there is something about hill and mud that bring me back to some great CC races almost 15 years ago.

I Put in a extra 600m on the hill around the fort just to make the 9 miles and it didnt take too much out of me . Didnt run with my watch today as I didnt want to focus on time, but now I wish I did..

After a hard week it was just the run I needed today .

13 days to race and will have to start think about what I want to run for this 4 mile, I think 32 mins might be a bit outside my grasp for a CC race but I will do a 5k time trial on friday and I should have a better picture of where I am .

All in all, best weeks training this year, even if i was sluggish for a few of the runs.. role on Week 3.

shels4ever

Well Rest day today then back to a tempo run tomorrow. Feeling really good today which is great after my second longest run of the year. Signs are that my training is showing some results.

So today i'll jsut do a vrey short swim and relax in the pool for a while.. I'm starting to hate rest days. ...

From now on I'll prob jsut update the log twice a week after my interval session and long run unless its race week.

dna_leri

sobriquet wrote: »

Good stuff shels, best of luck. You seem to have a habit of asking running related questions that I find fierce useful, we seem to be at about the same level, if I'm not being too presumptuous.

On your goal: I got my 8k time from 46:41 to 37:46 last year to this (both the Streets of Galway), mostly from the work I did since the start of the summer - 4/5 days a week, intervals, tempos, long runs etc. Not even with much consistency as you can read in my log. Given the training you've done and the time till Feb you'll destroy that target.

Shels - good to see you have started a log - I will be keeping an eye on your progress. As someone who came back to running this time last year after a 20+ yr break, i can also relate to your experiences. Keep it up.

shels4ever

Well really need to get out today, but its horrible out, I think i will finish work about 4:30 today to brave this rain.. try to get a 45 min run in.. if possible...

cfitz

shels4ever wrote: »

Well really need to get out today, but its horrible out, I think i will finish work about 4:30 today to brave this rain.. try to get a 45 min run in.. if possible...

Don't let the weather stop you training!!

shels4ever

Good day today.

AM
2 miles followd by some weights , situps , squats and some other core work .


PM
4 mile run with 2 X 15 mins tempo work, Felt very good today and ran well in the park/mud... I don't know for some reason I like these condition. Rain held off while i was running apart form one 5 min spell.

shels4ever

What a great day again today. Plan was for an easy 6 mile at 10 min mile pace.. in the mud again..

6 miles 59:34 slow i know.. but its a planned slow run

Didnt look at the watch for nearly all of the run, finding it hard to run at this pace for more the a few miles as i keep speeding up, had to stop once to slow myslef down as i was getting quicker over the last 2-3 miles.

Was a nice session and found it very easy today.. I've increased my mileage and i'm feeling very good..Will see how the intervals go tomorrow.

This is the 3rd week and next week i will reduce my training a little, i'm working on the premis of 3 hard week to 1 easy week, plus i will race on sat 18 th

shels4ever

Ok not sure what to do now,

plan for today is 5 X 800m in 2 horus time..

But have a 5k run tomorrow and not sure if i want to race of get around and there is a 5 mile race on sat.. .. what to do..

Better to stick to my session and race next sat of take a rest day today and run a hard 5 on sat morning ???

shels4ever

Well today was a horror sesson so so hard. Started out with 1 mile warm up and then into the session

4X 800m with 3 min recovery

1. 3:42
2 3:35 too fast
3 3:43
4 3:49 really hurt at about 400 m was really happy to finish,

Found it really hard today, There was some wind but the 3rd and 4th set really had to dig in , Was happy to have everything under 3:50 but was slightly too fast on the second interal and paid for it at the end.

2 mile very slow warm down.. Feeling great now, but that was hard today....

cfitz

It's good that your feeling the pain on them 800 reps, they're not meant to feel easy especially for the first few weeks.

I think you're too inclined to jump into races. If your plan is to race well in a few months time you don't need to race much at the moment. Just concentrate on the training and run a race about every 4 weeks to see how things are going. Run a few extra races when you're a bit closer to your peak race. Also, it's unusual to do a time-trial the day after a hard session - I'd definitely suggest keeping them further apart in future. (Aswell, I'd consider a time-trial very similar to a race, I wouldn't advise doing them too often.)

shels4ever

Yep your right, At the start of my training i used the races just to get me out the door to run, but now i dont have that problem.

I defo wont be running on sat now, its going to be my day off, but tomoorw its a work thing so need to do the 5k , will only do it as a tempo run now , I know it should be an easy day tomororw.

Good point on the reps not been easy, the hill on the 4th rep i'd say 2-3 months ago I would have give up, but was able to push on, so thats some progress at least. Would like ot get the times down to the low 3 mins but thats going to be months away...

showry

I'm doing 4 X 800 once a week at the moment and they are hard. They'll pay off though.

shels4ever

showry wrote: »

I'm doing 4 X 800 once a week at the moment and they are hard. They'll pay off though.

how long was it before you start seeing results from them? i'm thinking of 6-8 week but going to keep them up for 16 week and then go to 400's.

showry

I started seeing results pretty quickly,
I only started doing proper speedwork around the beginning of the summer and by about midsummer had about 2 minutes off my 5 mile time - most of which I was putting down to speed sessions.
In our current league I'm about 2/3 minutes faster than I was at the start of the summer.

I put in my details & target time to runningforfitness and it gave me routines and target paces.

shels4ever

Well 5 k today started way to fast went throuhg 1k in a shade over 4 mins ... really paid for that.. have some speed in my legs but can really feel the week running..

finished with a time jsut over 24 mins, target was sub 24 but not too unhappy.


Rest day today then a 9 miler tomorrow and the end of week 3 total miles will be 29 ..

Easy week next week ...

shels4ever

Well rest day today, did some reading and planning for my next few months. As the goal is to get down to sub 38 by Feb , Going on my 5k time from yesterday i'd say i'd have a 41 min in me at the moment of close to it. Didnt run too hard at all and didnt even release it was my best 5k of they year. In March i ran 29 mins , then Juky 25:30 now 24:40 the day after a hard session to. So i'm happy with the way things are going. On some runs now I feel that there is a running inside me trying to get out.....

Would like to get into sub 40 shape in the coming week, Tommor is my last day of the 3 hard weeks and will do a 9 mile in the park. Then it will be a very easy week with the XC next sat , 4 miles is jsut about right for me at the moment. Will not race this but run it at a tempo pace would like to run 32:30 33 mins but depends on the course.

Been flicking throuhg the book i've been using to see if i shuld drop my 800m reps this week, but not too sure , might jsut do 2-3 of them at race pace on tuesday.

shels4ever

Today cut my run short as the legs are in bits at the moment , very tired today after what has been my best week of they year. Jogged around a 6 mile route today, planned to do nine but the body was telling me not to push it.
Miles this week 27 target was 29 but i'm not too upset with that.

cfitz

shels4ever wrote: »

Then it will be a very easy week with the XC next sat , 4 miles is jsut about right for me at the moment. Will not race this but run it at a tempo pace would like to run 32:30 33 mins but depends on the course.

Been flicking throuhg the book i've been using to see if i shuld drop my 800m reps this week, but not too sure , might jsut do 2-3 of them at race pace on tuesday.

If you are only running the race as a tempo there's probably no need to drop your 800m reps. But I suppose if it's supposed to be an easy week maybe it makes sense to replace the session with the race...

shels4ever

Yes think your right, I'm going to drop the session and actually and race at the weekend, There are one or 2 people who have beaten me this year that i'd like to beat.

shels4ever

5 miles easy today jsut under 20 min miles, had to stop once to slow me down as I was feeling a little too good at the 2 mile mark.

Changed into spikes at 4 miles and did a mile in them, felt strange but ok.

shels4ever

Rest day today. This is actually turning out to be a harder then a traiing day, This I will start a weight session on one of my rest days as 2 days of doing nothing per week is hard for me now.

cfitz

shels4ever wrote: »

Rest day today. This is actually turning out to be a harder then a traiing day, This I will start a weight session on one of my rest days as 2 days of doing nothing per week is hard for me now.

How long have you been on 5 days per week?

shels4ever

Since the start of Sept I've been doing 5 days a week. But my mileage is not too high at the moment some runs have been 3 miles, the last 3 week i've increased it a bit.

cfitz

About six weeks so, I suppose you should probably stick with 5 days for a little while longer. Maybe you could start running 6 days per week around mid Novemeber - early December. Whenever you do add in the sixth day, a nice way to do it might be to just start out with a nice relaxed short run and every 2 weeks or so up it by about 5 minutes until it's a decent length.

Anyways, I'm rambling! You know your own program, sounds like you've got things in good order...

shels4ever

hay any rambles are more then welcome

I though about the 6th day a bit when i started this program, but wanted to focus more on getting all the aspects coverd ie temop, intervals and recovery runs. So the 5 days worked out ok, I did do 6 sessions last week with on AM PM day and that went well, but still had the 2 rest days.

While I did say my Goal is to go sub 37mins for 5 mile soon, my main going is to get back to around 31-32 for 5 miles which i do feel is possible, Weight is starting to fall off at a slow rate and i can perdict that i will be on target for my 37 by feb, with an outside chance of sub 35.

ike

Been keeping an eye on this shels4ever - good going. Once i get Dublin out of the way I intend to keep things going as much as possible over the winter and hopefully build up some speed. I'll say you'll have no problem I took nearly 5 mins off my 5 mile time in about 6 months and thats with no specific speed training.

The weight has a lot to do with it as well.

shels4ever

Cheers well i'm not to worried about the weight now, i'm eating well and training hard so it is coming off slow but getting there, the winter should see me drop about 1.5 stone..



Today 4 miles every easy but built up from 1o min miles to run the last mile at target race pace . Feeling good legs are fresher then last week so looking good for sat.

stmochtas

Best of luck on Saturday, looking forward to hearing how you get on.

shels4ever

3 miles easy today in spikes run very slow to start then did some strides to get used to the feel..

shels4ever

Well up today at 7:30 for a big of grub and to get ready for hte first race for Boards AC.

Today the plan was to run sub 33 for the 4 mile Cross Country course. Anywhere near this would have been good progress and a step in the right direction.
As I'm yes to go under the 40 mins make for 5 miles this year it could prove to be a hard mornings work.

Arrived at the race and have a few strange moment meeting up with the guys in the car park before hte race. Its not the normal race prep to be looking for men in a car park pre race, but once we met the team we got readt to run.

The course itself wasn't too bad, some muddy sections and a long slight incline at the end of the lap, and only to steep hills at the start of each lap.

So plan was for 8 mins miles,

Started of in midfield and started ad a steddy pace, for hte first inned lap, after 300m we hit the first hill , manager to get over then with no problems and legs feleing good, passed a few people on each hill, and was riunning strong . Had to tell myself to relax after about 800 m as the pace was slightly too face, So i eased into a nice pace and tempo was good.

End of lap one and I was feeling good but maybe running slightly too fast, onto the second lap pace was steddy and started to catch more people on the hills each time. One the end of the second lap the legs were feeling tired but still strong times looked to be a bit slow at 17 mins was a bit suprised by this but the reach was to become clear later.

Lap 3 I needed to dig in a bit and was running well, mid way throuhg the lap I caught a group of people one who has beaten me in all races this year by a large amount. It was a good feeling to be passing people at this stage of the race. Got to the end of lap 3 and had about 3-4 people runing a few second behind me . This is the stage in all races this year that i've fallen apart.

Started lap 4 and tried to pick up the pace on the 2 hills to start but they took a lot more out of me on this lap, took me a while to recover and I could hear people coming . Mid way through the lap i was caught my my rival but I was feeling really good at this stage, and just increased my pace a little so he knew that i wasn't gone just yet.

I think my 800m reps really helped me out at this stage , I just hung on for most of the last lap and with abotu 600m to go started to up it. Managed to pull away from the group and finish in a time or 35.30 .

For 4 miles I wasn't too happy with that but it turnes out that it was actually measured at 4.5 of 4.49 mile..


If that is correct this was my best run of the year with 7.5 mile pace..

All in all happy days looking good for my sub 37min 5 mile later in the year, and mybe gettting close to that now.

I hung around after the race for a while and ended up been the 3rd scorer on the Boards team that picked up 1st place in the D standard Team event.

All in all a good day.. I've missed Cross County....

stmochtas

Excellent running. Looks like we good be racing each other sooner than we thought .

Had a poor week myself and a bit of a niggle in my right leg too. Fingers crossed next week goes well, taking two rest days to make sure that I dont get injured.

showry

good running shels,
looking good for promotion too eh?

shels4ever

yep looking good on all fronts now

Will have a nice recovery run tomororw , then back into a hard 3 week training.

shels4ever

Last day of my easy week. 3 mile recovery run today. Legs are not feeling too bad at all after the XC yesterday.

Back to 3 hard week now and aim to get my mileage up by about 5-10% this week. So the aim is for 30 miles for the week.With my usual 800m on thursday but this week I will add an extra rep to bring me upto 5. Will see how that goes.

Next race will be 5k on November the 8th , This will be at the end of the 2nd hard week so I will see how the legs are closer to the time,

shels4ever

5+ Miles with 2 X 15 mins at tempo .

Felt good , ground was soft and legs were a little tired after. Had to slow myslef down after the second tempo for my last 10 mins running. Getting a bit carried away on some runs but holding back a little.

Of to bed now have an early run tomorrow..

shels4ever

5 + miles today.



Easy run at a slow pace. Plan is for for 9:30 min miles.



Ground was very soft today and runners are full of mud, and legs are now a little tired. Guess the soft ground it taking more out of me. But i'll try to stick to the grass all winter.


Will be doing a weights session tonight also

shels4ever

Well today is my usual rest day, i'm feeling really good today, upper body a bit tired after weights yesterday.

I did pack the gear into the car today as the weather looked good, So I may go for a very easy 3 miles later, so see how I get on with a 6 day week.

Diet this week has been really good a part from the wine last night.

Did an Easy 3 miles in the park was very relaxed 3 miles but wanted to do an extra few miles but decided to stick to the plan.:)

shels4ever

This was my hardest session of they year. Got to the park about 9:30 and the rain and wind was horrible. It was the type of day that a year ago I would have give up and not trained.

Warm up 1 mile

Session wasnt great wind was too strong on the up hill sections of the 800 m and I was very very tired.

1 3:47
2 3:51
3 3:55
4 3:59 very slow almost stopped by the wind.

This took a lot out of me today and could jsut about manager an 800 m warm down.

One thing about the session, even if it was so much harder then the past few , between rep's i've recovered so much quicker. After 2 mins I was almost ready to go again. I may reduce the recovery time in a few weeks.

Glad to have finished that, at one point I think the wind was so strong that I stopped..

shels4ever

No running at all today ,

Did some weights this morning and a short 15 min cycele to warm up.. Feeling very fresh and cant wait to run tomorrow.


PM

20 mins streaching . Will pop down to the park tomorrow and do a 5-6 mile taking in a few hills at easy pace.

shels4ever

Wind , Rain , Mud , hills

A nice 8 mile run in the park today, weather was horrible soaked and lashed with the wind but got around at a nice relaxed pace and felt good.

Enjoyed this run even if the condition were very hard, legs are going to be tired tonight as it was very soft underfoot.

shels4ever

Nice 3 mile run today very slow and easy, legs were a little tired but felt good.

Only 28 miles for the week as I did an 8 in place of a 10 yesterday . Next weeks target miles 30-32 .


Need to increase my long run to 10miles plus from next week on, and try to get s 7-8 mid week also. Will stick to the 6 days a week for the next 2 weeks and then a 5 day week on my easy week. With 2 weight session and one other core session a week. All in all happy enough with this week signs are i'm going in the right direction and by January I should be on track. May do the Belfast marathon next May but will decide that in January.