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Send in the Clowns - BAC 10K Challenge
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Nearly all gone sadly.nerraw1111 wrote: »Nice Christmas beers by the way. That Founders Dirty Bastard has a great kick to it. I'm loving their all-day IPA, gorgeous stuff. I also had a bottle of Anderson Valley Hop ottin IPA which I'd highly recommend.
Thankfully, I've taken a respite from the beer for a while, so I'll have some to savour, when I return to it. Founders all-day IPA is fantastic and thankfully, low ABV by comparison to most craft beers, so extremely drinkable. I definitely overdid it on the sweetness and the hops over xmas though, so my best beer of the period was definitely the rauchbier (smoked Marzen). So much so, that I started checking out how far it is from Frankfurt, to the village where Schlenkerla is made (Bamberg), but the 210kms may prove a bridge too far, post-marathon.
I was most impressed with the menu system, which is very user friendly (very untypical of Garmin). I didn't think they had release the app for synching via Bluetooth, but that may be an Android limitation. Are you using an iPhone?nerraw1111 wrote: »On topic, ish. I've a 220 after upgrading from a 305 and loving it so far. So light, picks up the satellites very quick, seconds. The bluetooth is great when it works. I did find uploading a bit buggy initially, had to reset the watch and garmin connect a few times before it would upload.0 -
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Friday: 6 + 5 miles easy
Went on the fallafel run at lunch-time to pick up our weekly fallafel rolls, only to be struck-down in the harshest way, when I found the farmer's market closed in some kind of crazy extended xmas holiday. Don't they know that there are diligent employees back in work who need sustenance? I bet you elite runners don't have to put up with this kind of crap. So had to run an extra mile to Subway instead, for some unhealthy sloppy food. (6 miles @6:52/mile).
After work, I ran home in the crazy weather, that thankfully was more of a cross-wind than the expected head-wind. I'd forgotten just how cleansing that Friday evening run home from work really is. By the time I hit the darkness of the park, work is almost two miles behind me, and there it stays, firmly parked. If you happen to live a runnable distance from your workplace, do this one thing - run home on a Friday. Best run of the week. 5.44 miles @6:59/mile.
Saturday: Recovery 5 miles
Splooshy (what a great word!) 'recce of the master's xc route in anticipation of the following day's race. Ground was pretty firm, particularly with the morning's hoar frost, but if they chose the two fields closest to the railway line, there were some particularly damp boggy sections. Legs felt particularly lifeless, but I've learned that this isn't typically a predictor for subsequent days racing. 5 Miles @7:38/mile. Followed up with a few hours of easy family rock climbing, and some tougher bouldering (just to make sure that the upper body would be just as tired as the legs for race day.
Sunday: Wicklow Masters XC
Trudged over to Shanganagh in pretty awful conditions (strong winds and sheets of rain), which is my mental picture of what cross-country is supposed to be like. Met up with Beepbeep and Abhainn for an easy trot, and watched Emer run her first XC race in, what must be 30 years (yes, she's that old
). Managed to clock-up 2.5 miles of warm-up, before very reluctantly peeling off my gear. I was absolutely frozen heading to the start-line with the other 40 or so brave 'ould guys (really they should run the masters race first in the calendar, when our bones are less brittle and the the arthritis makes us somewhat less creaky). There were a handful of M35s in the race though, hopping around and stretching with obvious elasticity.
I had missed the race last year, due to the same damn infliction that bothered me today, but thankfully, this time around I was at the tail end of it, rather than in the midst of it, so didn't think it would bother me until after the race, when the chest infection would rear it's ugly head once more. I hoped to run well in this race to get the year off to a good start and with Mick Byrne absent (who is typically a dead cert in these races), I figured a podium should be achievable. One other runner had finished a couple of minutes (and spots) ahead of me in the senior XC, but I'd been laid pretty low with illness at the time, so hoped to provide a little more of a challenge. After figuring out which direction to face, the gun went off, and I started a little more energetically, finding myself in around 5th position after the first bend. DL (the favourite) surged ahead pretty early, opening a gap on the rest of us of 2-3 metres, but when he realized he was on his own (and possibly concerned over the strong head-wind) he backed off, until we caught him. So at the bottom of the hill, there was a small pack including the leader, myself, Cormac, Abhainn and Beepbeep. Cormac pushed ahead on the slight incline and myself and DL chased after him, so as we turned into the head-wind, Cormac took the brunt of it, with the two of us in chase. Cormac stayed with us for most of the lap, on each occasion taking the lead into the head-wind (moral victory!), until eventually he dropped off and there was just DL and myself. Mile 1: 5:38.
As we hit the downhill/tail-wind section for the second time, the leader opened a 3-4 metre gap on me, and I just couldn't match him for speed. When we hit the bottom of the hill and started the brief climb, I closed the gap again, only to have him forge slightly ahead again, once we hit flatter ground. As we hit the second field, I took a wider line than he did, and the gap widened to around 5 metres. Each time we hit a flat section, he opened the gap a little more. Mile 2: 5:32.
The race was becoming a little like an interval session, with tough sections into the wind, followed by recoveries when the wind was behind us. By lap 3 I was feeling a little tired (mile 3: 5:37), but knew that second place was in the bag if I just maintained the effort. I never managed to gain any ground on him (in fact he widened the gap gradually), but I seemed to be widening the gap on those behind me too. Over the final mile I picked up the pace slightly, more to finish well, but was never within touching distance. Chatting to the winner afterwards, he thought we still had to complete another lap, so likely had plenty in the tank left. I crossed the finish line in 22:23, with a final mile in 5:32, at which point the chest infection caught up with me (three minutes of phlegm-retching provided a much needed core/cardio work-out).
The winner finished a strong 14 seconds ahead, and I had a gap of 22 seconds on the next runner. Between Abhainn, Beepbeep and myself, we just missed out on team gold (had to go to the rule book to separate the results), but some silverware, nonetheless. I was a little disappointed that I couldn't provide a greater challenge to the winner, but recent lack of quality work showed, particularly on flatter ground. I was happy looking at the stats afterwards, showing a 5:34/mile average pace for the race, but Beepbeep's Garmin activity shows quite different stats, so either I was running a very bad line, or my Garmin is trying to flatter me (unfortunately it seems like the latter). Regardless, it was a good workout, and my legs actually feel fresher than they did before the race, so a good outcome. A 4 mile warm-down catching up with Abhainn and Beepbeep took me to 10.5 miles for the day, and 70 miles for the week, and week 1 of base-training well and truly ticked off.
Summary: 2nd place Wicklow XC ould fella.1 -
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Should be fixed now. It's pretty remote (not a single car or person did I see) and the peace and views are fantastic. It's actually called Sutton's Lane, not Taylor's Lane (which is actually in Ballinteer). Here's the view up the hill (if the link works for you).Hey KC, I was intersted to see the exact spot where you did you hill spints as I work very close, but unfortunately your Garmin profile is set to private so I can't view0 -
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BeepBeep67 wrote: »Wow are you part of their advanced testing group
Do you not have the 35s yet? You'll not even have heard of the 36's then. They're so light, you drop a couple of pounds just by wearing them.0 -
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Krusty_Clown wrote: »
Haha, be honest you were going down there anyway with selfish intentions :pac:
(I have sent another spy down this evening to get a second opinion) 0 -
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Friday: Recovery: 5 miles @7:37/mile + 5 miles @7:35/mile
Saturday: St Anne's Parkrun
My guilty pleasure is trying to finish first in all of the Parkruns (starting with the Dublin-based Parkruns) which is quite a challenge, as beyond the immediate need to run faster than everyone else who turns up that day, there are also new Parkruns springing up every week. Emer mentioned that she was planning a Parkrun on Saturday, to get a marker for where she is right now. I persuaded her to go out to St Anne's instead of the nearby Marlay Park, as I'd managed to finish first in all of the other Dublin races.
Getting up on Saturday morning, there was a brief moment of indecision, when we looked out the window at the sheets of wind and rain, but sure you might as well face the demons earlier in the morning, than later in the day. On the 30 minute soggy, wet drive over to Raheny, I took several opportunities to remind Emer that this was all her idea (even though secretly I had implanted the idea in her brain). A quick stop at the loo, and we made our way to the start. I decided to jog a quick lap of the course, but didn't realize that I'd only left myself 12 minutes to do it, so had to pick up the pace to avoid missing the start. I flung off the jacket as I approached the start area, but thankfully the run didn't start for a few minutes after I arrived. Had a quick chat with ChristieB, and made my way to the start, trying to leverage my way near to the front. When the gun went off, I was back around 15 places, which suited me fine. It looked like there were some pretty decent runners ahead, based on the choice of running shoe, club singlets (despite the cold), Ironman tattoos and lack of Christmas padding.
Lap 1: After the bull-horn, I got past a few runners and settled into around 10th place, just behind the triathletes. Just ahead a group of three runners opened up a gap, so I pushed on and caught them, dropping in behind the group. I had no interest in my race time, I just wanted the first finish, so I couldn't let the leading group of runners drop me. I was happy to stick with them for the first lap, just to get a feel for what I was up against, with the hope of pushing on, when/if the opportunity arose. We would our way around the course, sploshing through puddles and the pace felt pretty pedestrian for a 5k. As we hit the main avenue, the watch beeped after the first mile and I risked a quick glance, and was surprised to see 5:39, which would explain why the pace felt so comfortable. Two of the runners took to the main road, while myself and a runner in a Kilkenny singlet stuck to the path, which meant some ducking and diving under the tree branches, which were heavy with rain. I noticed that the two runners on the road seemed to drift off the pace, so I caught the Kilkenny runner and ran alongside him along the fast avenue. I noticed he was breathing pretty heavy and as I held the pace he had been running at, he started to drop off, which was a bit of a surprise. I hadn't planned on taking the lead quite this early, but dialing back the pace would be a mistake so I just stuck with it.
Lap 2: The volunteers gave us a big cheer and rousing encouragement as we passed by the finish line and I could hear a gap opening behind me. I didn't want to risk a glance back, but got a sense that Kilkenny was falling away. I just focussed on maintaining what felt like a decent 5k pace, while making sure I didn't push myself over the red-line (didn't want a repeat of the Malahide blow-up/blow-chunks double whammy). On one or two of the turns, I risked a sideways glance and saw that the gap was now 100m. Mile 2: 5:26. I just wound my way around the course, trying to maintain the pace, always a little paranoid that the assault would come at any moment, but whenever I got a chance to look back, the gap was widening. I hit the main avenue again, and knew it was in the bag, I just had to hang on until the finish. Mile 3: 5:29. I picked up the pace for the finishing straight and crossed the line with a couple of hundred metres to spare.
Checking the watch/results afterwards, the time wasn't the quickest (17:01), but that was largely down to the rather chilled first mile. It's definitely a fast course, and on a dry day with some sharp runners, I reckon some decent times are achievable. Hat's off to the volunteers who did a stonking job, in pretty appalling weather conditions. They still managed to look and sound cheerful, directly in contrast to us miserable runners. So for now, I've collected all the Dublin Parkrun badges... until the Ardgillan/Balbriggan course comes online in three weeks time.
Summary: 5k in 17:01
Sunday: 20 mile steady run
Great company for this run, with Beepbeep, Abhainn, theboyblunder and clubbie lining up on a cool Sunday morning at 9:15am. I'd plotted a route of two 10 mile loops with a decent climb in each, in order to simulate the Connemarathon route. The plan was 7 minute miles, which suited my tired legs just fine. The first loop took us up Killiney Hill, but in a moment of early-morning-cobweb driven confusion, I took us up the wrong turn and we ended up climbing a significantly steeper grade of hill than I had planned (past the Canadian embassy, instead of Bono's gaff!), but we struggled our way up, with the lads effin' and blinding me under their breath! Much relief when we hit the top and got to enjoy some downhill miles afterwards. Tried to reign in the pace a little, but these group runs tend to get a little enthusiastic and by the time we'd made our way back to the cars for a quick drink, the average pace was around 6:53. We parted ways with Bepbeep, who had completed his 20 mile run the day before, and was ratcheting up another 10 mile steady run.
For the second loop, we headed up Puck's Castle Road, which has a similar profile to the 'Hell of the West'. In fact as Abhainn pointed out, Puck's Castle presents a tougher challenge, as it's 15m more climb, over a similar distance (with further climbs before and after the hill). But what better way to simulate a tough course, than run an even tougher course. Theboyblunder was forging his way ahead on the uphills, and the only way I could keep him in touch of the group was to send himself and Abhainn the wrong direction a number of times, only to call them back once we had taken the correct turn. Once we crested the hill, the pace picked up again, and we were knocking out miles at a very decent clip. One final nasty surprise for the lads, as we passed down and back up a steep valley, that had my 5k-weary legs screaming at me to stop, before we were back on level ground and hurtling back towards Bray and the comfort of the cars. A very enjoyable run, despite the nasty hills. Some very tired/lethargic climbing in the afternoon, followed by my first couple of beers for the year. After a solid 83 mile training week, I reckon I earned them.
Summary: 20 miles in 2:15:46, @6:47/mile0 -
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Krusty_Clown wrote: »So for now, I've collected all the Dublin Parkrun badges... until the Ardgillan/Balbriggan course comes online in three weeks time.
Your mountain marathon will stand to you for the Ardgillan Parkrun 0
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