Can I do it?

LarMan

Thursday

Chickened out of yesterdays run so decided to do it today on the treadmill for a change.

Summary 8.3KM in 35 minutes @5:24km

LarMan

Friday

3 miles, gave this one a good try and recorded my fastest time of 25:19 so pleaseed with that.

Saturday
golf 39 points pleaseed with that !!

Sunday
6 miles, horrible run, did not feel up to it at all, trudged around, decided to take a new route and see if you can run along the beach from Shankhill to Bray. You can't! ended up having to walk to the point I could get back to the park and start runing again.

All in all about 10K in an hour

Monday

3 miles reverse of the route on Friday, not a bad run, tried to minimise the impact on the ground as I feel I hit the ground quiet hard and maybe keep my feet on the ground to long. I was trying to get the feeling of gliding along.
Summary 3 miles in 25:57

Weight this morning was down to 84.7KG despite a lot of chocolate eating so again pleased with that!

LarMan

Tuesday

5.5 miles. Did some of this run along the cliff path from Bray to Greystones. Pretty uneventful run pace was fine and I did one sub 5 minute kilometer at kilometer 8 to see if I had any speed left after the previous 7.

Summary: 5.5 miles in 48:57 @5:25 pace

LarMan

Wednesday

was meant to do interval training, but the it was raining and cold and I was feeling very bloated after dinner so decided to just do a 4 mile run as it required less concentration. First part was slow as I was sluggish after a dinner that was short on natural ingredience and high on stodge.

Last part quickended up as my digestion kicked in.

Summary 6.5KM in 35:47 @5:29 pace

Weight is 84.3KG

LarMan

Thursday

Interval training. 10 X 400 meter with 1.5 minute rest in between. This is always a hard session for me so glad to have got it out of the way. It was a little cold at the start and some of the intervals were into the wind. In general I am pretty happy with the times.

Off to a stag this weekend but still need to try and get in a 7 mile run and two rounds of golf so hopefully this will nullify any food/drink over indulgence

Weight this morning was up slightly at 84.5KG I hit a milestone at weight watchers yesterday 4 stone lost so far in just under 11 months. Only another stone or so to go.

LarMan

Monday

7 miles. This run should have been done on Sunday but I was at a stag over the weekend and despite my best intentions I could not bring myself to run on Sunday so I did it today. this was a loop of Bray taking in some of the cliff walk as well. It is downhill all the way to the seafront and then uphill all the way back. I started raining towards the end but all in all not too bad weather conditions. I'm always tempted to go faster than I should as I like to see the times dropping, but I was pretty good today at just running by feel so I was pleased to see relatively good times at the end.

It's less than two weeks to the 10K night race and I am hoping to do it in less than 53:00

Weight this morning was down to a new low of 84.1KG

LarMan

Tuesday

6 miles on sore knees. Did this run just after dinner so was very sluggish.

Summary 10.6KM in 58:34 @5:32 per KM

Weight 84.2KG

LarMan

Wednesday

Horrible run, felt a stitch coming on from very early in the run, felt out of breath and was huffing and puffing all the way round. Legs felt dead. Just a horrible 4 miles.

Summary 36:06.6 6.42km @5:38

Weight 84.3

LarMan

Thursday

Much better run than the day before was able to push it a little more, first two KMs were uphill and then a km and a half downhill with the rest flat.

Summary 25:58.9 5.02KM @5:10 per KM

Friday
Normally this is a rest day but everything was delayed by a day as I could not do my run as planned on Sunday. I decided to do this one on the treadmill as I find I need to have a flat course to run at my planned race speed. The race is flat so it's not really cheating (well maybe a little cheating)

Anyway done first thing this morning before work. I maxed my speed at 13KM for two minutes and then either side of the max had a pyramind starting/decreasing by .2KM each minute. So all in all I spent about 20 minutes at over 12KM or over which is my planned race speed.

Summary 50:00 9.04KM @5:33 per KM

Weight this morning was 84.2KG

LarMan

Sunday

My wife was away this weekend so this run was done at 9pm on Sunday, I was thinking of putting it off as it was late but then realised the race next week is on at 8:30 so this was infact the perfect time to do the run.

I mislaid my runners so had to use my old pair and really noticed how much less cushioning they provide so I have a sore knee at the moment.

Summary 1:09:21.2 12.81km @5:25 per KM

This week is taper week so the milage is greatly reduced. My target time for this 10K race is sub 53 minutes.

weight this morning was 83.8KG so nearly 8lbs lighter than when I ran the half marathon a month ago.

LarMan

Monday

3 miles recovery, I put the heart rate monitor on with the aim to keep my heart rate below 140. for the most part I did this, I can't say even with the heart rate in the 130s that I ever felt comfortable.

I am wondering in a race what heart rate I can run at and sustain that effort?

Summary 28:38.1 5.00KM @5:44

Weight this morning was 83.7KG

LarMan

Tuesday

Another 3 miles in HR Zone 3. Reveresed the route and with the heart rate kept in that zone stayed pretty comfortable all the way around although on the uphill sections I need to slow right down to keep my heart rate down.

summary 5K in 27:07

Wednesday

As this is taper week just a 5 X 400 interval session. I did this on the treadmill as the weather forecast for today is for heavy rain so I didn't want to miss out it.

I also figured out that I have been doing my intervals too fast so since I could control the speed on the treadmill I set the speed at 12.5km which is .5KM above my 5K speed to compensate somewhat for it being on a treadmill.

Summary is 4K in 25 minutes.

LarMan

Thursday

So this was the final run before the 10K. I have been back using my heart rate monitor for the last few runs so I decided to try and run this entirely in Zone 4 which has a heart rate of 148 - 167.

At the start (which is usual) the heart rate montor was measuring way too high, 181 before I had even started, so I was trying to run at a rate that I felt would be close to the effort needed but which was not excessive. As the first couple of KMs are uphill I was slower than I had expected. The first KM was done in 6:09, after that the watch started behaving itself and I was able to stay in Zone 4.

I did the same run as last Thursday but this time I wanted to stay in Zone 4 all the way through. This was more effort then I usually put in and it showed in the time. The splits came in as

1 6:04.2 1.00 6:04
2 4:45.2 1.00 4:45
3 4:34.4 1.00 4:34
4 4:50.4 1.00 4:50
5 5:09.2 1.00 5:09

There were faster than the last week except for the first KM which was 24 seconds slower than last week. Overall I was pleased with the effort and the time but I am not sure if I could keep up the same effort for the entire 10K. Also this route has steep enough hill at the start and then a steep downhill.

On the steep downhill I was close to going into Zone 3 but felt like it would be hard to go faster as it would bring on a stitch.

Anyway the summary is

Summary 5KM in 25:23.4 @5:05 per KM

Also on another positive weight was down to 83.3KG this morning

LarMan

Samsung night Run 10K

Well I had been lloking forward to the is race for quiet a while but the whole weekend was going to be special, my eldest son was making his confirmation on Saturday so relatives were up and thats were my story starts....

Friday

Decided to pick up my race pack on Friday evening, her mother was also coming up from Cork so it was perfect timing. Pick up pack at 5:30 and then drive down to Heuston and pick up Mother in Law. So to give my other half some space to get the house in order I said I would bring my 3 youngest kids, 8 4 and 1. Drove into town and parked in Dawson street. We were in there for 4:30 so plenty of time to wander up to Grafton street and do some last minute shopping before the confirmation. Youngest son started saying he had a pain in his tummy which is usually a sign that he wants food, so off to Mcdonalds for a treat for them. So now it is coming up to 5:30 and we start walking a little quicker, son says he is now tired so now I pick him up to walk the rest of the way.

We get to the Trinity Sports center at 5:40 and there is a Q but nothing bad - except this is the Q to get into register as the hall is alredy full! 20 minutes later and with a baby now getting more and more upset we have to abandon waiting as we are late to pick up MIL.

The Q at this stage was quiet large. Anyway as we are walking back to the car the baby starts straining! We get back to the car and as I am putting her in to the car I notice she is wet, brillant I'm blaming my wife for giving her to me with what must have been a full wet nappy. I start to change her and to my dismay realise the wet is not pee! Toxic nappy is now I describe these, more liquid than solid and everywhere!

At this stage I need to apologise to the good people of Q park for what I left in their rubbish bins. Although they did rob me of 8 euro for less than 2 hours parking.

Eventually we picked up MIL 10 minutes lates and stress levels were back to normal.

Saturday was a long day, confirmation took 2 hours 15 minutes!. People behind would not stop talking all the way through. Eventually go sick of them talking and asked them to be quiet. Waited the rest of the ceremony for a slap to the back of the head, thankfully it never came.

Off to Avoca then for some proper race weekend nutrition of Antipasti, burger and chunky fries and desert.

Sunday
So I was looking at the forecast from a few days before and it was forecasting rain and I had hoped it would be wrong but Sunday morning was dry so took two of the kids, no baby this time, and drove in to town to pick up race pack. We were able to get parking close and strolled into trinity for 10:25. No Qs this time and we had the race pack by 10:30 then it off to Dundrum for some tracksuit bottoms. Everything done by 11:45 and home.

I don't like bad weather and once it started raining I spent the next few hours before the race wishing I didn't have to do it. I also spent time looking at the race website waiting for the cancellation of the race to be announced - no such luck!

So I got my geat on including hat and gloves and remembered the last time I race in March in sunny warm weather and thought of the pathos of the Irish weather. Nearly May and weather you would expect in December.

So plan was to drive into Booterstown and get the Dart into Town. I live in Bray but decided I did not want to spend long on the Dart if I was soaking at the end and my car would be a nicer environment.

I got into town about 7:15 and spotted a work colleague and we spent the rest of the pre race together huddleing from the cold and wet. I had 3 layers on and was still cold. I was also going to run in same 3 layers so not ideal for running.

There was an attempt at a warm up but with the amount of people there it was difficult to have the room to do all the arm movements.

We then moved down to the start, I was in the 45 to 56 group. Again I have a couple of times in mind before the race. Sub 53 was my worst case scenario and sub 50 was my best case. Give the weather I knew Sub 50 was not going to happen and I was worried sub 53 was going to happen. I had a plan in mind and that was get to an effort that was pushing it but comfortable and then run hard at the end.

So off I went and this was my first experience of running with so many people so it was a challenge navigating throught them, I was wearing contact lens for the race and the drawback with these is that I can't read the small digits on my watch, so while I could see the heart rate I could not see what my race pace was, so I forgot about times and just kept going by heart rate.

The race itself was obviously very wet but was not unduly uncomfortable which surprised me. I also felt pretty OK during the run, no niggles or pain.

Given the weather there wasn't anyone out cheering us on except for the marshalls who were really excellent and encouraging and who must have been freezing out there.

So having no idea how fast I was going I waited until I felt I was at the 9K mark and then put in more effort (not sure I sped up but I put in more effort)

At the 200 meter to go mark (felt longer than 200 meters) I put in close to maximum effort and crossed the line showing 53:26. However this was the clock from the start gun and since we were further back I knew I must have gone faster than that. I looked at my watch and it said 49:35 but having done only 9.78KM, so I was a bit confused as to how fast I had gone but I knew at least that it was proably sub 51. Once I got home I checked the computer and the time was given as 49:58. I'm really delighted with that espcially given the conditions

Summary 10K in 49:58 (chipped time)

LarMan

Monday

3 mile recovery run. No niggles after the race on Sunday so did a 3 mile recovery run at a gentle pace as recommended by McMillian. Still could not jog at that pace @6:30 but did slow down to @6:00 pace.

For this training cycle I will try and adhere to his recommended training speeds.

Weight this morning was 83.3KG

LarMan

Tuesday

Crap weather last night but went out anyway for 3.5 miles at a very leisurely pace of 6:13 per km average. This is a lot slower than I would normally run these but this is what McMillian recommends and he says I will be amazed at the results!

Weight this morning is 83.3KG

Just looked at the suggested optimal running times and I was going slower than suggested. I should have been running at between 5:53 and 6:11. Lesson learned

LarMan

Wednesday

Back to the intervals

8 X 400 @ 5K pace with 1:30 rest

Fianlly found out how to get my watch to display pace while running the intervals so was able to maintain a 4:30 per KM pace. Heart rate peaked at around the 160 mark during intervals.

weight this morning was 83.1KG

LarMan

Thursday

4 easy miles, McMillian recommends a pace of 5:53 to 6:11 per KM for these runs, I kept it at more or less at the 5:53 and it was pretty effortless- most of it was downhill which might explain the ease.

Summary

Time 37:18.5
Distance 6.41
Avg Pace 5:49 per KM

Weight this morning was 83.1KG.

LarMan

A weekend of excess


Sunday
I was out Friday for Dinner so needed to run to balance the over indulgence. It was a beautiful morning on Sunday and I was out on the roads by 7:40am for a nice easy 5 miles. Superb run with gorgeous weather, very little traffic and people.

Summary 5 miles in 46:44 @5:50 average

Monday

the excess didn't stop on Friday, I was in Monaghan visiting family on sunday afternoon into Monday evening and ate like a pig. Big dinners, chocolates, crisps. Got home at 7:30 in the evening and had to get straight out while the weather was dry. A nice and easy 3 miles.

Summary 3 miles in 29:20 @5:42 average

LarMan

Tuesday

4 miles today in I think about 37 minutes. It was raining pretty hard when I went out and my watch started going crazy starting and stopping by itself. Auto pause wasn't even on so I have no idea what was up with it.

I ran by feel and I hope I kept the pace at the right speed but I can't be sure.

Summary 4 miles in 37:39 @ 5:53 per KM pace

Weight is up after the weekend at 83.7KG

LarMan

Wednesday

40 minute tempo run. This weather is pretty depressing and it is a struggle to get myself out the door. I'm fine when I get out running but going out in the rain and cold is never easy but then what do you expect to get in May :mad:

Anyway wanted to divide this into three parts. Medium fast run, fast run and then back to medium run. Watch was back working so pace was spot on.

Summary 7.5KM in 40:00 @5:20 per KM

Weight was up again to 84.1KG

LarMan

Thursday

4 easy miles

Summary 6.56 KM in 38:35 @5:53 per KM average

Weight was 83.4KG

LarMan

Sunday

6 miles, this is my LSR run so the speed was kept slow but it was still a very tough run, I did this first thing in the morning and I probably wasn't hydrated properly and I found each mile even at the relatively slow pace tough.

Summary 10K in 59:39 @ 5:58 average

Weight took a big drop over the weekend and is now 82.3KG

LarMan

Monday

3 Miles loop. My watch had another glitch so I ran a couple of the KM at slower speeds than planned as the watch was telling me I was running at 5:44 so I slowed down to get the speed back up to 5:53. I was actually running at over 6:00 per KM but it tool me a while to figure that out.

Weight today was 82.6KG

LarMan

Tuesday

Easy 4.5 miles, did this run by heart rate and kept it below 140 at all times which resulted in a time much slower than my usual slow pace.

Summary 7.23KM in 44:39.5 @6:11 per KM

Wednesday

Did an interval session on the Threadmill this morning 9 X 400 with 1:30 rest

Summary 5.25KM in 31:23 @ 5:59 per KM

Weight is creeping up again to 82.8KG

LarMan

Thursday

4 miles today, I was meant to do this at an easy pace but I needed to complete it faster so ran a little harder. I was reading about old houses in Bray so decided to incorporate this by running past one of the houses. Certainly made the run more enjoyable with a "payoff" so to speak.

Summary 6.5KM in 36:12.7 @ 5:34 per KM

Weight was 82.7KG this morning

LarMan

Sunday

The training plan had this as a 5K race but since I did not have a race to do. I did 5 miles at not quiet race pace.

Summary 8KM in 42:32.0 @ 5:19 per KM

Bad weekend with the diet and weight was up to 83KG

LarMan

Monday

3 easy miles in beautiful weather

Weight has stayed the same 83KG

LarMan

Tuesday

5 miles in the nice weather, took a trip through the park which was nice. Nice combination of hills and downhills.

Weight was 82.4KG

LarMan

Wednesday
45 minute tempo run

Thursday3 miles

Sunday
6 miles, nice weather I did this run first thing in the morning without food and probably dehydrated and struggled around.

Weight 82.9KG after a wedding and a communion.