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Eye of the Tiger Beer.
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A little later than usual, but no need to worry - I'm still running. Just life getting in the way of sitting down to update my log (i.e. travelling to San Francisco).
This week was fairly exciting as these things go I guess. I was home alone with the kids for a few days, and I pinged Ososlo to see if she wanted any company for a run, so on Tuesday I headed up to Santry and did some very pleasant miles with her! I then had a pretty decent session on Thursday - I think it was the first on the plan with some 5k pace running, so I notionally picked 3:42/km as my desired pace and used that. The 6 1km repeats were mostly pretty comfortable, and for the last one I pushed myself a little. This was a good confidence booster and I really feel like the plan is doing what it's supposed to! Not content with social running with one boardsie this week, on Saturday I was plodding around Malahide and recognised PaulieYifter, so we plodded together for a bit and had a natter. Finally on Sunday I flew to SF, but got up at 5AM to get my long-ish run in - I was running on empty and didn't want to risk bonking so took it pretty easy, though in the end it was pretty comfortable.
Date|Distance|Pace|Notes
15th May|10.4 miles|8:54|Easy enough ramble home, a little warm in the half decent weather
16th May|5.1 miles|8:00|Session #1 - 6 x hill sprints (up the Pavillions pedestrian flyover) and 8x30s strides
16th May|6.8 miles|9:19|Lovely miles around Ososlo Park with Ososlo!
17th May|6.7 miles|8:09|Out to Malahide Castle in the afternoon
18th May|10.8 miles|7:39|Session #2 - 6 x 1k @ 5k pace off 500m jog recovery - paces: 3:39, 3:35, 3:38ish, 3:37, 3:37, 3:33
20th May|6.4 miles|8:41|Hungover miles while the older kid was in speech and drama
21st May|13.8 miles|8:27|Out at 5:20AM to get a longer run in before the flight
21st May|3.6 miles|8:27|Some SF miles to avoid falling asleep!
Total: 64 miles
Next week: Well, I've already started by doing another double
- this week is a stepback week in my version of the 5k plan. I might just do all easy running until Saturday, when all things going well I'll give the SF Parkrun a decent crack. I might throw some strides in one of the other days, depending on how cranky I am from the jetlag. 0 -
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The week over in the startup mines in SF went pretty much to plan. I got in desired milage, did an early morning jog across the Golden Gate Bridge (it was very foggy though) and did the Crissy Field parkrun. The parkrun went well enough, though I was feeling the effects of a hangover from some post-work Friday night beer and negroni. I jogged over to Crissy Field from my hotel on Union Square, which was about 3 miles, and a large hill, away. There weren't many people there when I arrived, however I was warmly greeted by Dale, the run director who shook my hand and inquired as to my background. I think he seemed a little disappointed when I said I was over for the week. There were just 63 people running, and over half appeared to be blow-ins like myself from countries with a more active parkrun scene. The run definitely didn't start at the advertised time (9:00), the briefing started around 9:10 though Dale did joke that they wanted the last parkrun in the world each Saturday. The usual course wasn't available, so we were led over to a carpark ("avoid the cars!") and got underway. The route was an out and back on a jetty, back through the carpark and onto a mixed use path beside the park for another, longer out and back. The surface wasn't great at times, though the route was flat enough and the wind wasn't too bad though noticeable when running out towards the Golden Gate Bridge. The run wasn't too much to write home about - the positions quickly settled in the small field, though I overtook one lad who must have gone out a bit too hard around half-way through. I finished in 19:33, one second slower than my second best 5k which isn't bad at the end of a long week and with a bit of a head on me The time is a little bit disappointing, but acceptable under the circumstances.
Other than running I spent around 4 hours on a bike on Saturday, going around a few parks in SF then heading across the bridge and ending up in Tiburon. I naively got woefully sunburnt, the entire week was cloudy and foggy up until Saturday. My friend who I went with kind of bonked, he plays a good bit of 5-a-side football but clearly isn't an endurance athlete, and he was kind of destroyed for the last hour. It was all very easy cycling really though, I think we didn't even break my 10 mile/HM/Marathon PBs :pac:
Date|Distance|Pace|Notes
22nd May|8.1 miles|8:40|Easy enough along the Embarcadero before work.
22nd May|3.1 miles|9:15|Less easy in a sweaty small hotel gym treadmill. Probably a bad idea.
23rd May|13.7 miles|8:45|Over to the Golden Gate Bridge, over the bridge and back again. Fog removed a lot of the spectacle, but still a spectacular run.
24th May|7.6 miles|8:26|Easy again along the Embarcadero.
26th May|8.8 miles|8:17|More easy in the usual place
27th May|9.8 miles|?|To and from and running the parkrun.
28th May|13.6 miles|8:44|Union Square to the Golden Gate Park and down to the Pacific, and back again.
Total: 64.9 miles
Next week: Normal life and 5k plan resumes0 -
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...I ended up going to The Slanted Door in the Ferry building, best noodles I've ever had.
Anyway, this week wasn't great but wasn't terrible. I mostly got over jetlag relatively quickly, it turns out if you don't fly hungover and don't drink before, during or after the flight it's a lot easier, though I still felt relatively tired for the rest of the week. I didn't go out on Monday after arriving into Dublin, but run commuted the rest of the week. I didn't have time to get in a session during the week so just did some strides on one of the commutes. Saturday was also very busy (the eldest's seventh birthday party) so I did my first ever early morning session, which went fine. I picked what looked like the easier of the two sessions on the plan (a continuous tempo run) which got easier as it went on. Earlier today I dropped the now seven year old off at a birthday party in a playcentre in Balbriggan and did slow hungover long run around the environs while he was partying away - he has a far better social life than I do!
Date|Distance|Pace|Notes
30th May|10.1 miles|8:22|Commute home
31st May|10 miles|8:06|Commute home with 10 x 30s strides
1st June|9.2 miles|8:35|Commute into work
2nd June|10.9 miles|8:17|Slightly longer commute home via the Malahide Rd and Feltrim
3rd June|8 miles|7:46|Early morning session, 22 minute tempo (6:30 pace)
4th June|13.2 miles|8:48|Hungover long run around Balbriggan and Ardgillan. Tried to get to Skerries along the coast but got tired of running on a road with no path. Some decent hills in Ardgillan, that's a parkrun I'll be happy to avoid Had to check where I was a couple of times, and went over a pedestrian bridge, and dawdled crossing roads etc., i.e. took things actually quite easy. Lovely views from the coast there over Skerries and the Mourne mountains.
Total: 61.5 miles
May total: 271 miles
Next week: More of the same. I have a parkrun in the plan, which will probably be a sub-20 attempt at Rivervalley. If I can't make it I'll replace it with the missed session from last week.0 -
Another so-so week. I think I had a very mild cold during the week, my better half definitely has one and either way I was a little chesty and tired. My mid-week session got pushed to Thursday, and I ended up doing it pretty late while listening to the UK election coverage. I felt sluggish and that translated into merely adequate paces. A recovery commute in the morning on Friday also felt a little tough for what it was.
I showed up to the Rivervalley parkrun after a decent night's sleep looking to go sub-20 - I'd gone 20:08 and 20:09 in the past and I was hoping that the 5k plan would help me break through the roundly shaped number. At the start I'd noticed that the only fast regular who was there was volunteering and there didn't appear to be any tourists who looked like they were club runners (there were some blokes in singlets but they looked like gym bunnies). I lined up beside the regular first female finisher and as usual stuck behind her as she tore down the hill (she always does that). I overtook her about 1km in, just before the first big hill. Today's plan was to take the hills ridiculously easy and recover fast, though I still found it tough to speed up once at the top. Over to the second downhill and I was doing ok but not really hitting pace, just about staying around the 20 minute mark. By the time I got to the hill for the second time (cruelly at the end of the 4th kilometer) I knew I was a little behind pace, but still took the hill very easy. I could hear the pitter-patter of a potential overtaker behind me and was convinced that I'd lose my position but it didn't happen. I managed to get going ok once at the top, though I knew sub-20 was basically gone. Around a minute before the finish I could hear that the guy behind me was closing the gap so I sped up, finishing with a reasonably fast finish in 20:12. Oh and my first time being first finisher
Had some chats to the guy who came second (5 seconds behind me) and the female first finisher (finished in just over 21 minutes). Your man had done Cork the previous week, happy to have gotten home in just under 4 hours while the first female ran Dublin last year in 3:10... goes to show how non-linear race performances can be at different distances (their parkrun PBs are just 14 seconds apart too).
Date|Distance|Pace|Notes
5th June|9.3 miles|9:09|Easy bank holiday miles around Malahide
6th June|10 miles|8:30|Regular commute home
8th June|11.1 miles|8:07|Session - 2x1200, 2x1000, 2x800 @ 5k pace off 3 mins. Paces were 3:47, 3:43, 3:41, 3:47, 3:45, 3:44
9th June|9.2 miles|9:02|Tougher than it should've been easy commute into work
10th June|8 miles|?|Including 20:12 parkrun
11th June|13.4 miles|8:25|More running around suburbs while the 7 year old is at a party. This week was Ashbourne! It's not a great place to run around, not many paths, non-existent parks and busy roads. I found a nice quiet country road eventually.
Total: 61.3 miles
Next week: Very likely to be 60 miles, a couple of sessions and a long run 0 -
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Another so-so week. I think I had a very mild cold during the week, my better half definitely has one and either way I was a little chesty and tired. My mid-week session got pushed to Thursday, and I ended up doing it pretty late while listening to the UK election coverage. I felt sluggish and that translated into merely adequate paces. A recovery commute in the morning on Friday also felt a little tough for what it was.
I showed up to the Rivervalley parkrun after a decent night's sleep looking to go sub-20 - I'd gone 20:08 and 20:09 in the past and I was hoping that the 5k plan would help me break through the roundly shaped number. At the start I'd noticed that the only fast regular who was there was volunteering and there didn't appear to be any tourists who looked like they were club runners (there were some blokes in singlets but they looked like gym bunnies). I lined up beside the regular first female finisher and as usual stuck behind her as she tore down the hill (she always does that). I overtook her about 1km in, just before the first big hill. Today's plan was to take the hills ridiculously easy and recover fast, though I still found it tough to speed up once at the top. Over to the second downhill and I was doing ok but not really hitting pace, just about staying around the 20 minute mark. By the time I got to the hill for the second time (cruelly at the end of the 4th kilometer) I knew I was a little behind pace, but still took the hill very easy. I could hear the pitter-patter of a potential overtaker behind me and was convinced that I'd lose my position but it didn't happen. I managed to get going ok once at the top, though I knew sub-20 was basically gone. Around a minute before the finish I could hear that the guy behind me was closing the gap so I sped up, finishing with a reasonably fast finish in 20:12. Oh and my first time being first finisher
Had some chats to the guy who came second (5 seconds behind me) and the female first finisher (finished in just over 21 minutes). Your man had done Cork the previous week, happy to have gotten home in just under 4 hours while the first female ran Dublin last year in 3:10... goes to show how non-linear race performances can be at different distances (their parkrun PBs are just 14 seconds apart too).
Date|Distance|Pace|Notes
5th June|9.3 miles|9:09|Easy bank holiday miles around Malahide
6th June|10 miles|8:30|Regular commute home
8th June|11.1 miles|8:07|Session - 2x1200, 2x1000, 2x800 @ 5k pace off 3 mins. Paces were 3:47, 3:43, 3:41, 3:47, 3:45, 3:44
9th June|9.2 miles|9:02|Tougher than it should've been easy commute into work
10th June|8 miles|?|Including 20:12 parkrun
11th June|13.4 miles|8:25|More running around suburbs while the 7 year old is at a party. This week was Ashbourne! It's not a great place to run around, not many paths, non-existent parks and busy roads. I found a nice quiet country road eventually.
Total: 61.3 miles
Next week: Very likely to be 60 miles, a couple of sessions and a long run
Not bad going for a so-so week. I'd be delighted with that sort of outcome. Congrats on the win first place!0 -
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Nicely done B, well done on the first finisher and that is very interesting on the marathon times of the two runners. Wasn't there a thread on here before about Usain Bolt's likely marathon time if he ran one....can't recall the predictions though!
Jaysis, don't mention the war!
Woo hoo, first finisher... !! Well done B... sounds like a tough course, might not add it to my parkrun tourism list.0 -
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This week looked a step-back week, with just some strides in place of sessions... actually I've just realised I read the schedule wrong when putting my spreadsheet together, the damn Kindle version has the table spread over two pages
:mad:
Anyway, the highlight of this week was popping over to base2race and buying my first pair of racers (Asics Gel DS Racer 11) and a new pair of regular runners (Brooks Ghost 10). The last pair of regular runners I bought was over 8 months ago(!), I've been rotating around 4 pairs of increasingly battered runners since then. I did some steady running and strides in the racers and they felt great, and the Ghosts feel pretty good - they actually have some bounce as opposed to anything that's been on my feet over the last few months! The lowlight of the week was being over-optimistic with today's weather and trying to do a longer run on the faster side. I was out in the heat on Saturday and it was totally fine. 90 minutes into the long run things went downhill and it turned into a slog. I was a bit crocked for a few hours afterwards, as if I'd run a race. I managed to get a nap in, and felt a good bit better afterwards.
Date|Distance|Pace|Notes
12th June|10.2 miles|8:49|Very easy commute home
14th June|2.8 miles|10:32|Very easy lunch miles with a co-worker, popped down to the TCD track
14th June|10 miles|8:29|2 sets of 5 strides in a warm weather commute
15th June|4.6 miles|8:55|Easy miles around Swords in the morning
16th June|10.9 miles|8:13|Commute home via the outskirts of Malahide
17th June|9 miles|7:31|Strides and some steady miles in new racers. Headed out to Malahide along the estuary.
18th June|14.1 miles|8:05|Heat-bonk-tastic long run around Malahide and Portmarnock
Total: 61.7 miles (10 weeks in a row of 60+ weeks... this has to count for something)
Next week: A VO2 session and a tune-up parkrun 0 -
With a tune-up race parkrun scheduled for this week, I figured I was better off jettisoning the VO2 session and being relatively fresh for Saturday, especially since the middle of the week was hot and not very suitable for that sort of session and a tough session on Thursday would definitely be in my legs come Saturday. So not much to report on during the week, other than a couple of faster commutes, one with strides.
I decided to jog over to Malahide rather than thrash myself at another sub-20 attempt at Rivervalley as it's a better fit for the race experience of the Docklands 5k (flatter and a better field to work off of). My hope was to run my second fastest 5k so that a full on PB assault at the Docklands was realistic, though I'd be happy if I had a good session. I lined up close to the front and was quickly overtaken by about 20-30 people within the first few metres. I didn't bother checking my pace until I'd start to push past a lot of early sprinters and by the time we were turning the corner at the bottom of the pitch-and-putt course it was showing near PB pace (3:45). I did a surge or two to stick with a group who had formed and overall it felt pretty comfortable. I eased off going back up the hill, and caught up and passed a few more folks heading into the forest. I knew that my watch couldn't be trusted for a lot of the rest of the course, and I don't remember looking at it again for pace until the last km. I felt really comfortable in the 4th km, I remember thinking that it was the best I've felt during this part of a 5k parkrun/race. I kept my mind busy with the odd surge and trying to hunt down fellow parkrunners. Coming up to the hill in the last km one of the lads who I overtook was coming up strong behind me, and as he was beside me near the top of the hill he gave me some encouragement and from nowhere I got another gear. We both went past another guy just at the top of the hill, and I went all out until the end, finishing in 6th place and was very surprised at 18:52 on my watch (parkrun timing was 18:53) - had I known I was within farting distance of my PB I might have gone faster! This was a great confidence booster, hopefully with a bit more stimulus, a short taper and flatter course I'll be able to PB on Thursday week (also I probably won't be up late watching Radiohead at Glastonbury with a glass of wine the night before the race ).
Date|Distance|Pace|Notes
19th June|9.1 miles|8:53|Very easy commute home
20th June|10 miles|8:05|Another commute, with a fast finish
21st June|5.5 miles|9:07|Went out early in the morning for a few miles before work to avoid the heat.
22nd June|10 miles|8:07|Commute home with strides
23rd June|9.2 miles|9:05|Easy commute into work
24th June|9.5 miles|?|To/from Malahide parkrun, and an 18:53 parkrun
25th June|14.1 miles|8:29|Another early morning run, went out to Newbridge House and Donabate. The roads to/from aren't great to run on (no paths), but they were quiet enough at this time of the morning.
Total: 67.5 miles
Next week: 5x1k @5k pace at some stage, then just easy and strides until the race.0 -
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This week wrapped up my 5k training plan, now to wrap myself up in cotton wool and run the race on Thursday evening! I'll do a separate post with a review of how the plan went. For now here's the usual run-through of the week's running.
Date|Distance|Pace|Notes
26th June|10 miles|8:59|Very easy commute home, featuring a wave to annapr who was doing as much as you can in a car to get somebody's attention short of beeping the horn or crashing into them
27th June|10 miles|8:24|This was a weirdly tough commute, slowed down on the way to keep things easy.
28th June|9.9 miles|7:52|Last big session - 5 x 1k at race pace. Target was 3:42 with recovery jog of 500m (a lap of the fields where I do these). Splits ended up being 3:42, 3:39, 3:43, 3:41, 3:39. It was a little windy and drizzly, and I wasn't wearing my racers, so hopefully things are still looking good for Thursday. Middle one was toughest for some reason.
29th June|9.1 miles|8:33|Wet commute home
30th June|5.7 miles|7:57|Off to a wedding, so a quick morning jaunt around the Fingal 10k course
1st July|9.7 miles|8:06|Some strides and 1k @ 5k pace on the Malahide parkrun course, which felt a little tougher than it should have due to the wedding the night before!
2nd July|13.1 miles|8:02|Early Sunday morning commute listening to Mary Anne Hobbs on BBC 6 Music. Went up along the runway per denis_b's recent exploring which was ok. It's a good time to see some big planes come and go, but along the runway could really do with a path. Did a couple of laps of Ososloville and picked things up a little to get home. Accidentally ran a royal flush for the mile splits (my watch has been on kms and zero split alarms since the session on Wednesday).
Total: 67.8 miles
June total: 276 miles - I narrowly didn't get to 1500 miles by July 1st, but 3000 miles for the year is definitely still in play
Next week: Docklands 5k!!! Taking it very easy until then. I'm off to rural Netherlands for a wedding on Friday, so obviously I'll drag the runners along though we'll see how much actual running happens.0 -
Haha, I often pass you on that stretch on my way home, but you're not usually on that side of the road... I was actually on a work call in the car, hence the mad but silent waving
Looks like you're in good shape for Docklands, might see you there.0 -
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5k training plan review.
The MSB 5k was so terrible that it gave me a good kick up my ass. All I'd done at that stage in the year is a collect a few cheap PBs (1 mile, 5 mile, 10 mile) while plodding away. I wanted, at the very least, to get back to somewhere around the form I was in last summer.
I roughly followed the 60-70 miles per week 5k schedule from Faster Road Running, starting back in the last week of April. It's a 12 week schedule, though I knew that at least one week would be lost due to travelling to SF.
I ended up with a plan that looked like this:
So the first session was immediately dropped for the IMRA Howth race :rolleyes: - I moved the tempo to Saturday and did the not-quite-all-out race instead of some hillsprints (I guess an IMRA race counts as a sprint up a hill? ). I ended up doing all the long runs between 13-14 miles, which was a bit longer than specified but I don't think any damage was done. When my default run is a 9 or 10 mile commute any less than that doesn't really feel long! In all but the first and last two full weeks I took one rest day. I didn't really get into the habit of doing doubles, the commutes generally suit me, though I'd like to do more doubles. Having a rest day is useful to play around with so that I don't get too tired.
Out of the 18 sessions on my version of the plan, 2 got dropped - one was switched out for strides as I was still tired after arriving back from SF, and the other was also switched to strides due to proximity to the tuneup parkrun after a misreading of the plan. I did pretty much 60 miles every week and though not every session went perfectly I generally hit desired splits. In retrospect I think more running at faster than 5k pace should have been prioritised, I dropped one of the 1 mile pace sessions.
Overall I'm happy enough with how things went, and hopefully can do the work some justice in a few days time. If not, then it wasn't the worst training for the Fingal 10k where I'll be going for another PB 0
i was hooked from episode 1 
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