Dublin Marathon 2012 - Mentored Novices Thread

Darren 83

Runchick wrote: »

First week back running after injury now complete. I did 2 short runs during the week, the first resulted in a very sore hip and I thought that was the end of me as I doubt I could do DCM if I had much more time off. But I kept a positive frame of mind and continued with the physio exercises and plenty of cross training on the bike - which doesn't affect my hip thankfully. So attempted another short run a few days later and it was much better, just a niggle from 2 mile.

So this morning I attempted a longer run - physio suggested 7 miles but to stop if I felt pain. So I headed out at 6.30am fully expecting not to get too far. I couldn't believe that I hardly felt a niggle in my hip other that a dull discomfort at about 5 mile. I took it easy and managed 9 miles, the last 2 miles completely niggle free. I am over the moon that things appear to be improving.

I've changed a few things now as a result of this injury. Firstly trying to run with a lighter foot. This takes practice but definitely puts less pressure on the joints. Also I've been doing 20-40 miles a week on the bike to keep my fitness up and have really enjoyed it, so I think I'll incorporate cycling as cross training from here on. The bike really works the glutes which I need to be strong to prevent further injury.

I can't believe how quickly I've recovered and how doing the physio exercises really works. Anyone out there with niggles or potential injuries my advice would be to see a professional and follow their advice. I am still cautious about moving forward from here and doubt I'll be doing pace runs for a few weeks yet, but I'm optimistic about getting to the start line on 29 Oct. I guess the 20 miler will be the tell tale week...

While running benefits calves and hamstrings, it largely ignores the front leg muscles that biking helps: the quadriceps and the shins. By strengthening the muscles opposite those exercised by running, biking helps you improve running performance and avoid injury, I use cycling as my ct both will complement each other.

fungirl1

Hi all

12m lsr in park yesterday was seriously hard. Porridge sat in a lump in my stomach the whole time...back to bananas next week I think!! Heat was a factor too. Tried my first gel ever 10m....reckon I needed it about 8.5m as there was nothing in my legs from 9 -10m and I felt ok again having taken the gel.
13m next week!!

fG

Darren 83

fungirl1 wrote: »

Hi all

12m lsr in park yesterday was seriously hard. Porridge sat in a lump in my stomach the whole time...back to bananas next week I think!! Heat was a factor too. Tried my first gel ever 10m....reckon I needed it about 8.5m as there was nothing in my legs from 9 -10m and I felt ok again having taken the gel.
13m next week!!

fG

Which gel did you use?

Trampas

back after my 22.5km run 6.05 min pace.

Got around on 1 gel and water. Knees are tired but to be expected as longest run ever. Only another mile next week which isn't to bad.

The hardest part can be deciding on where to run as I like to do different runs.

Time for some protein

blockic

Trampas wrote: »

back after my 22.5km run 6.05 min pace.

6.05!! wow thats some pace, whats your marathon target time?

blockic

Done 15.5 miles yest in 2.20, lads in the olympics just done it in 1.15... mind blowing!!

irlirishkev

Hi there,

Pretty late joining this thread - hope that's okay!

I run all year round, but have only just decided to do the DCM.
I'm going to follow the Higdon plan as suggested in this thread, and successfully completed this weeks runs. The 12 mile yesterday was tough enough, but I did the Achill Half in July, so at least had that behind me.

I suspect I'll have questions as the training distances increase. 13 is the most I've run, and tbh the thought of doing 20, let alone 26 is pretty daunting!

I do have a question straight up, which is something I'm concerned about. I'm going abroad on the 9th October for a week with the GF (booked before the DCM decision).. this will be during taper mode, and I fully intend on bringing my running stuff with me to get some runs in, but there will be alcohol involved no doubt. My concern is how the alcohol will affect me.. any thoughts? At the moment, I've pretty much cut out alcohol except for one night a week.

Oh and one other question.. Is chocolate nesquik milk okay as a post run drink???

Thanks in advance, and here's the questionaire bit!


Have you raced before? If so what are your PBs? (Date and distance please!)
I actually did the DCM in 2006, but didn't train properly at all. Walked a lot of it, and was banjaxed for weeks afterwards.
I've done a few half marathons, and the race series in the Phoenix Park. Great Ireland, Docklands etc..
PB is this years Achill Half Marathon, which I finished in 2:03.

Do you still need to take walk breaks in your training? No problem if you do!
No.

How much training do you currently do? Distances, how many days a week, cross training - whatever you think is relevant
Up until recently, 2/3 lunchtime runs of 4miles each, plus a longer weekend run of up to about 8 miles.
This week was 3/6/3/12 as per the Higdon plan.

What do you want to achieve? Dream finishing time and realistic finishing time?
I want to run the whole course for a start!
Dream finishing time is sub 4, but realistically, if I come in under 4.15 I'll be happy.

How many days a week can you train?
up to 5 days a week.

Why are you running this marathon?
Last time I signed up, it was because it was something I wanted to do before I was 30.
I'm 35 now, and have never been happy with my performance in my last one. I want to do it properly.
Personal achievement, motivation for running etc.. all come into play.

Trampas

blockic wrote: »

6.05!! wow thats some pace, whats your marathon target time?

4 hours

blockic

fungirl1 wrote: »

Porridge sat in a lump in my stomach the whole time..

How soon did you go out after eating porridge, I normally wait 2 hours after eating and i'm always fine. Running too soon after eating is not great i think.

blockic

Trampas wrote: »

4 hours

Was that pace not a bit too fast? I'm assuming it was an LSR?

I'm targeting 3.30 but would be no where near thinking of running at that pace for training.:eek:

Trampas

blockic wrote: »

Was that pace not a bit too fast? I'm assuming it was an LSR?

I'm targeting 3.30 but would be no where near thinking of running at that pace for training.:eek:

About 30 seconds slower than mp but I want to break 4 hours but like to go as low as possible. Will head out with the 4 hour group and see how things are going around 30km mark

blockic

Trampas wrote: »

About 30 seconds slower than mp but I want to break 4 hours but like to go as low as possible. Will head out with the 4 hour group and see how things are going around 30km mark

It's just clicked with me, I'm thinking in miles! :rolleyes: It's too early for me on a sunday!;)

Pacing Mule

Hi everyone - another week gone :eek:

Week 8 is now ready to go on our sheet.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AvtQvl8pDuH3dEs0eDk2QUE4SUFRQVhTZlV1elNUdlE#gid=13

This weeks things to tell you about are:

Solbberdanim and Irlirishkev have both been moved into the main block alphabetically for week 8.

I have created an inactive members section at the end of the sheet. We appear to have lost a few members over the last few weeks who have stopped updating the tracker for whatever reason, they may have pulled out of the marathon itself or could be on extended holidays, injuires. Either way the weekly averages etc are being skewed downwards. What I have done is moved these members (which I am defining as anyone who has not logged in 3 weeks or more) to the bottom of the sheet for Week 8. Their runs are still there, still calculated in the mileage to date etc but won't be included in the weekly totals / averages unless they begin to log again.

As things stand we appear to have lost 6 members since we started (I didn't move younganne as I know she is stil participating ) with another 4 or 5 not having logged in last 2 weeks. These may be on holidays etc and might appear back this week but if they don't I will move them to the bottom next week and continue to do a sweep of those not logging in the previous 3 weeks as I update each weeks sheet. As soon as any member starts logging again they will be put back into the main group.

sassyj

Did lsr 12 miles this morning, knees are very sore. Think it's time to change runners!

tang1

My weeks milage for week 7 is in Tinydancer81's column now, any chance you could sort it out pls PM?

davemcmahon

Hi PM my data for the week just gone is also in the wrong row. its in the row for DCM2012. It appears that the name column has been shifted so people data is a number of places above or below. there also appears to be a number of duplicate entries under the name column

Pacing Mule

Will look at the edits now guys. BRB

career_move

Well was all excited to be doing my first half marathon today. Bit weird but I was very happy to see the rain when I got up cause I know i'd have died running yesterday.
I lined up behind the 1 50 pacers, Claralara and Joe and my plan was to stick with them for the first hilly 6 miles and then push on if it was there. The first 2 miles were grand. Had a nice little chat with Claralara and I was thinking things were going great. Then came the hills. CL and Joe said we were behind so we were pushing on at a good pace I thought. Big thank you to both pacers for getting me up the hills and for all the encouragement. I had a gel around 6 miles but it didn't give me much of a lift. I found it hard to take cause my breathing was slightly out of control!
Was disappointed when I dropped back off CL and Joe around 8 miles. My legs were tiring but I thought if I kept them in sight I'd still finish around 1 50. I'm not sure when exactly I lost sight of them. I couldn't believe we had another 5 miles to go. I was knackered!
Miles 9 - 11 were tough. I seemed to be going nowhere. I wasn't being past by people but I couldn't close the gap on the people in front of me either. After passing the 11 mile marker I really pushed hard and tried to work my arms to get a bit of momentum going. I passed a few lads and that gave me a bit of a lift. I knew there was another woman not too far off me. Anytime I slowed a bit she was on my heels. Keeping in front of her got me through the last couple of miles. She really pushed me hard near the finish but thankfully stayed in front of her and crossed over the line in 1 54 xx i think. Met Joe and then CL after the line and they told me the course was long. 14.45 i think they said. Not sure how that happened but it seems a bit all over the place cause mapmyrun has that course at 14.6 miles! Gave Joe a big hug for getting me up all the hills to mile 8. (Also I needed a bit of support as my legs felt weak) Got my goody bag and my finishers medal then had shower, tea, sandwiches and headed home

career_move

Pageant Messiah wrote: »

Will look at the edits now guys. BRB

Hi PM. My name has gone from Week 7 as well. Actually my data is in Corny's line

tang1

career_move wrote: »

Well was all excited to be doing my first half marathon today. Bit weird but I was very happy to see the rain when I got up cause I know i'd have died running yesterday.
I lined up behind the 1 50 pacers, Claralara and Joe and my plan was to stick with them for the first hilly 6 miles and then push on if it was there. The first 2 miles were grand. Had a nice little chat with Claralara and I was thinking things were going great. Then came the hills. CL and Joe said we were behind so we were pushing on at a good pace I thought. Big thank you to both pacers for getting me up the hills and for all the encouragement. I had a gel around 6 miles but it didn't give me much of a lift. I found it hard to take cause my breathing was slightly out of control!
Was disappointed when I dropped back off CL and Joe around 8 miles. My legs were tiring but I thought if I kept them in sight I'd still finish around 1 50. I'm not sure when exactly I lost sight of them. I couldn't believe we had another 5 miles to go. I was knackered!
Miles 9 - 11 were tough. I seemed to be going nowhere. I wasn't being past by people but I couldn't close the gap on the people in front of me either. After passing the 11 mile marker I really pushed hard and tried to work my arms to get a bit of momentum going. I passed a few lads and that gave me a bit of a lift. I knew there was another woman not too far off me. Anytime I slowed a bit she was on my heels. Keeping in front of her got me through the last couple of miles. She really pushed me hard near the finish but thankfully stayed in front of her and crossed over the line in 1 53 xx i think. Met Joe and then CL after the line and they told me the course was long. 14.45 i think they said. Not sure how that happened but it seems a bit all over the place cause mapmyrun has that course at 14.6 miles! Gave Joe a big hug for getting me up all the hills to mile 8. (Also I needed a bit of support as my legs felt weak) Got my goody bag and my finishers medal then had shower, tea, sandwiches and headed home

Got stung like yourself with the long course, had it at 14.3 on my Garmin. As said in the race thread in events, the race director put his hands up to it being long. Still no excuse but cant do anything about it now. Walked the last 1.2 miles as i was well annoyed at that stage. Ran a 6 min PB for actual half marathon distance but wont be taking it due to the long course.

Pacing Mule

Guys (tang,dave, career move) would you mind posting here on thread what you logged for his week / last week. Looks like this may have been borked before I created week 8 (which would mean all work done today was based on flawed info)

tang1

7.5 Monday & Tuesday, 9.25 Wednesday and 14.3 for today PM. Thank you.

Trampas

Problem with the total counts on this week spreadsheet. My totals have dropped down. I think most people are the same

menoscemo

career_move wrote: »

Well was all excited to be doing my first half marathon today. Bit weird but I was very happy to see the rain when I got up cause I know i'd have died running yesterday.
I lined up behind the 1 50 pacers, Claralara and Joe and my plan was to stick with them for the first hilly 6 miles and then push on if it was there. The first 2 miles were grand. Had a nice little chat with Claralara and I was thinking things were going great. Then came the hills. CL and Joe said we were behind so we were pushing on at a good pace I thought. Big thank you to both pacers for getting me up the hills and for all the encouragement. I had a gel around 6 miles but it didn't give me much of a lift. I found it hard to take cause my breathing was slightly out of control!
Was disappointed when I dropped back off CL and Joe around 8 miles. My legs were tiring but I thought if I kept them in sight I'd still finish around 1 50. I'm not sure when exactly I lost sight of them. I couldn't believe we had another 5 miles to go. I was knackered!
Miles 9 - 11 were tough. I seemed to be going nowhere. I wasn't being past by people but I couldn't close the gap on the people in front of me either. After passing the 11 mile marker I really pushed hard and tried to work my arms to get a bit of momentum going. I passed a few lads and that gave me a bit of a lift. I knew there was another woman not too far off me. Anytime I slowed a bit she was on my heels. Keeping in front of her got me through the last couple of miles. She really pushed me hard near the finish but thankfully stayed in front of her and crossed over the line in 1 53 xx i think. Met Joe and then CL after the line and they told me the course was long. 14.45 i think they said. Not sure how that happened but it seems a bit all over the place cause mapmyrun has that course at 14.6 miles! Gave Joe a big hug for getting me up all the hills to mile 8. (Also I needed a bit of support as my legs felt weak) Got my goody bag and my finishers medal then had shower, tea, sandwiches and headed home

That's a great run because the course was most definitely long. Given the hills and the extra 1.3 miles you most likely would be in 1:40 shape on a normal course.
I'd say you went through the actual HM distance in about 1:42 on that course, so you can count that as a definite PB.

The poor pacers were given an impossible task as they did the first 5-6 miles at normal 1:50 pace (8:20/mile) but when it became apparent the course was going to be very long they had to speed up and did the rest of the miles at about 7:20/mile pace.

Pacing Mule

Can you have a check over things now. Rolled it back quite a bit unfortunately so some peoples data may need re entering.

Tang your figures match (todays not in)
Trmpas as far as I can see your totals should be fine.
Career move is back in.
Dave - data no longer in DCMs boxes

Part of this is because there are formulas tracking the names from week to week so if someone does move a column somewhere it is changing across the entire sheets - I am going to edit these to be typed directly as the name rather than referencing another cell. This should make todays mess up less likely to happen again. (Also logged in to Google today to see a new feature allowing cell protection which might solve all the hassle)

If you guys wouldnt mind confirming all is ok now before I redo week 8 etc.

tang1

Pageant Messiah wrote: »

Can you have a check over things now. Rolled it back quite a bit unfortunately so some peoples data may need re entering.

Tang your figures match (todays not in)
Trmpas as far as I can see your totals should be fine.
Career move is back in.
Dave - data no longer in DCMs boxes

Part of this is because there are formulas tracking the names from week to week so if someone does move a column somewhere it is changing across the entire sheets - I am going to edit these to be typed directly as the name rather than referencing another cell. This should make todays mess up less likely to happen again. (Also logged in to Google today to see a new feature allowing cell protection which might solve all the hassle)

If you guys wouldnt mind confirming all is ok now before I redo week 8 etc.

Thanks again PM, only for you i don't know where we'd be. Mine is spot on now.

career_move

Pageant Messiah wrote: »

Can you have a check over things now. Rolled it back quite a bit unfortunately so some peoples data may need re entering.

Tang your figures match (todays not in)
Trmpas as far as I can see your totals should be fine.
Career move is back in.
Dave - data no longer in DCMs boxes

If you guys wouldnt mind confirming all is ok now before I redo week 8 etc.

Thanks PM. Sorry had to pop out for a minute. Mine is right now

career_move

tang1 wrote: »

Got stung like yourself with the long course, had it at 14.3 on my Garmin. As said in the race thread in events, the race director put his hands up to it being long. Still no excuse but cant do anything about it now. Walked the last 1.2 miles as i was well annoyed at that stage. Ran a 6 min PB for actual half marathon distance but wont be taking it due to the long course.

Hard luck Tang...at least u know you're in good shape though and a 6 min PB on those hills was savage running!

menoscemo wrote: »

That's a great run because the course was most definitely long. Given the hills and the extra 1.3 miles you most likely would be in 1:40 shape on a normal course.
I'd say you went through the actual HM distance in about 1:42 on that course, so you can count that as a definite PB.

The poor pacers were given an impossible task as they did the first 5-6 miles at normal 1:50 pace (8:20/mile) but when it became apparent the course was going to be very long they had to speed up and did the rest of the miles at about 7:20/mile pace.

Thanks Meno. I saw you running back out to cheer on the stragglers. Fair play! The pacers were brill to be fair. Really helped me out up the hills. Was sorry to see the balloons disappearing:D

Trampas

matches my garmin perfectly

Pacing Mule

A half marathon course over a mile long ? :eek: Ouch for everyone.