"I'll probably win the f***ing thing"

ahnowbrowncow

I've decided to do the DCM and the other races in the series this year. For the last couple of years I've wanted to do the DCM but I only get as far as the 5 mile and then pack it in due to injuries, laziness or any other excuse you can think of. So I thought I'd start a training log to keep myself on track and help fulfill my ambition of running a marathon.

I'll have football on 2-4 times a week so I'm going to try tweak the Hal Higdon intermediate 10k training guide around that for the first two races of the series, the 5mile and the 10k.

Fitness/running background: I've been training 2-3 a week and have had 1 or 2 matches a week since January so I should have a decent level of fitness. But I haven't ran more than 4k since last years 5 mile in Phoenix park :eek:. Oh and the furthest I've ever ran is about 10 miles while training two years ago.
I'll be using the football pitch close to me for training at the min. It's exactly 400m in perimeter according to my new garmin which is handy and hopefully running on grass will help prevent injury to my knees.
But I'll have to find somewhere to do my longer runs as it's boring just running laps and there's always the temptation to just stop.

Goals for the DCM race series:
5 mile: Sub 34min
10k: Fairly ambitious at the minute but Sub 40min
10 mile: Sub 70min
Half Marathon: Sub 1hr 40min
Marathon: Sub 3hr 30min

ahnowbrowncow

11th June

2k warm up and lots of stretching, legs feeling tired and hamstrings felt really tight due to a match the day before.
Did 2k in 7:47 min, pushed myself a bit too much as I was hoping to do more but with those 5 laps and the match the day before I was wrecked.
Did a 1k cool down and stretches.

12th

Football training, legs feeling quite stiff again but it was quite easy so if they continue to be like that I might count them as my rest days.

13th

1.5k warm up and stretches.

4k in 16:52 averaging 4:11 min/km. Purposely went slower than Monday as I wanted to get a few extra km ran. Longest distance I've ran in quite sometime, felt good getting back into it. Was feeling tired in the middle of it but it got a easier towards the end.

1.1k cool down and stretches.

14th

Match was cancelled today so another opportunity to get some running in.

1.6k warm up

8 x 400m intervals with 60 second rest in between
80
84.3
85.4
85.2
87.4
88
91.5
85.1
Was very windy today and my legs were a bit tired but even still those times aren't great. These runs are really bringing it home that running fitness and football fitness are two very different things.

1k cool down.

Strength training this evening

earnyourturns

Best of luck Declan Moffat!

Mr Slow

ahnowbrowncow wrote: »

Goals for the DCM race series:
5 mile: Sub 34min
10k: Fairly ambitious at the minute but Sub 40min
10 mile: Sub 70min
Half Marathon: Sub 1hr 40min
Marathon: Sub 3hr 30min

Your times don't tally with each other, have a look at the McMillan Calculator as a guide to see what I mean

Get yourself over to the Novice thread, lots of people in the same boat there to chat with.

Good Luck

ahnowbrowncow

earnyourturns wrote: »

Best of luck Declan Moffat!

Was hoping someone would get the reference

Mr Slow wrote: »

Your times don't tally with each other, have a look at the McMillan Calculator as a guide to see what I mean

Get yourself over to the Novice thread, lots of people in the same boat there to chat with.

Good Luck

Thanks, I've been reading that thread and lots of the other logs here and picking up lots of tips. Decided to start my own thread instead of posting in the novice thread for that extra bit of motivation cause I feel I'll have to get out running to keep updating this.

And those were just some rough goals, some I'd like to go faster and some I'd just be happy to get close to.

15th

Football match on Friday, wish I wore my watch to see how much I ran cause I did quite a lot of running and was wrecked at the end but I'd feel a bit stupid wearing a watch during a gaa match.

16th

Was expecting an easy training session but of course they decided to do one of the toughest training sessions we've had in awhile. My legs felt like lead from the start to finish and was tempted to quit but kept going, raised a few eyebrows at how tired I was

17th

I had planned on doing a longish run but I thought my legs could do with a rest so just did strength work.

18th

8.91km in 37min 52sec, average 4:15 min/km

It felt great doing some proper running on the roads for the first time in over a year.
It was tough enough cause there were some steep hills, gained 71m in elevation according to my garmin but it'll be good training for phoenix park.
I'm planning on running on the roads for my longer runs, laps are too tedious for anything over 4km. Just hope my knees can cope.

More strength training this evening

ahnowbrowncow

Tue 19th
Football training, fairly tough again but I was feeling fresh so it was grand.

Wed 20th
4.4km in 18:47, not much but I just wanted to get some running done.

Strength training

1hr of 5 aside.

Thurs 21st
Football training, nothing too bad but my legs were feeling very heavy at the end.

Friday 22nd
8.82km in 39:01, average 4:25 min/km. Very windy today, at times i felt like I was running but not moving forward . Felt quite tired but wanted to get 8k done today, have to start building up these weekly miles/km.

More strength training this evening.

ahnowbrowncow

Sat 23rd
Did absolutely nothing, felt great too

Sun 24th
4.42km in 17:45min, 4:01 min/km

Just went out for a short quick run.

Mon 25th
4.42km in 17:27min, 3:57min/km

Just another short quick run, was quite tough so doubt I could keep that pace for 8km just yet.

Strength Training that night.

Tue 26th
8:82km in 39:02min, 4:26min/km

It's probably my last run this week before the race on Saturday so I thought I'd do a longer, slower run today.
Going grand at about 4:16min/km pace for 5km until the dreaded knee pain started to hit me. Fecking dull throb of pain in my knee everytime my right foot hit the ground.

Surprisingly my knee was grand once I got inside, normally I can't bend my knee for a week when it hits so I should be alright for the race on saturady.
I've learned my lesson, no more fast runs on the road. Back to the pitch for some laps for the quicker runs and I'll try do the longer slower ones on the road... maybe.

Anyway that's enough running for me this week until Saturday because of football getting in the way, wish me luck. And best of luck to anyone else who'll be there

ahnowbrowncow

I was really looking forward to this race, had two days rest before so I was feeling fresh and ready for only my 3rd ever race and hopefully beat my pb of 33.29.

So I started in wave 1 and got quite close to the elites, hadn't intended too but people were moving up and I just followed. The race started and everyone flew off at the start. After the first 100/200m I looked at my watch and my average speed was 19km/h so I started slowing down to a more sustainable speed. Finished the first km in 3:45.
After that I decided to try keep my average speed over 15km/h.

Was feeling fine until I got to kyber road and my knee started getting a bit sore, it wasn't too bad but I had to slow down a bit and my average speed dropped under 15km/h and people were passing me out left, right and centre. But by the time I got over the hill on military road I had passed most of them out again and my knee wasn't troubling me anymore.

When I got to the 5km I was averaging 15km/h and I knew with the next few kms going uphill I'd have to put in a big effort to keep that average. The next 2.5km were tough but in my mind I aimed to pass the next runner in front of me and then the next and then the next etc. and that helped me keep my speed up.

With 500m to go the road had mostly flattened out and I picked the pace up, running down the finishing straight with people cheering you on is a huge motivator and it helped me make an extra push to the finish line. The race commentator even called out my name and county near the end and it put a big smile on my face

I crossed the line in 32:08, chip time 32:06. I'm very happy with that, a new pb and finishing 139th. Not too bad for about 2 weeks training and now the sub 40 10k doesn't look too ambitious if I put some good training in over the next 3 weeks.
It's a great feeling crossing the finishing line, can't wait for my next race

ahnowbrowncow

Hasn't been a great week, 3 football matches and 1 training session didn't leave much room for running.

Thurs 5th July
4.4km in 18:50 min
Just wanted to get out .and do some running.

Sat 7th
4.39km in 19:14 min.
Another short slow run but I didn't want to be tired for football.

Sun 8th
8.1km in 36:02.
Had planned on doing about 13km but my knee got sore again so I cut the run short. Got some strength training in later on.

I'm thinking of doing the bhaa 5k run on Wednesday and try get a sub 20min.