You only get what you give

Thanks D, I'd like to share more of what I am doing and not doing and hopefully become a better runner for what feedback I get.

Mon 03/01/2022

Started off my training plan today for the Adare 10K. I'm following the Hal Higdon intermediate 10K plan -> https://www.halhigdon.com/training-programs/10k-training/intermediate-10k/

My reasoning for picking this plan is that it fits in with the time schedule I have to the race which is 8 weeks and also the type of speed work involved tempo runs and 400m intervals which suits me fine. Number of days running (5) and mileage wise it's pretty much where I am at now (40K-50K a week) but adding in some sessions. Timewise I think I can work pretty well with this as for the easy runs I will probably do those at lunchtime. The longest session would probably take me 1-1.15hr so something I can do after work without too much disruption. Pretty busy with club stuff these days as well as being a coach and chair, I'm also one of the run directors for our upcoming 8K race in two weeks but that will pass soon enough. Anyways it's a pretty basic plan otherwise but I think will do for a good start to the year.

On the plan for today was 5K easy so did that on the local beach in Ballyheigue in 32:30, very easy pace which was good after the weekend's racing on Saturday. It was very windy for the run and despite running what is an out and back route it felt like you had wind in your face for most of the run as it swirled around and mainly came from side. My 9yr old daughter joined me for the last 1.5K or so which was nice, she abandoned her mother who she was out walking with to run with me...she probably misjudged the distance so needed encouragement over the last half a K! She'll sleep tonight.

Week 1 continued

Tuesday 04/01/2022

5K easy on the plan and got this done at lunchtime. Simple out and back route and job done no messing.

Wednesday 05/01/2022

This was due to be a session day on the plan but after a 6 day streak including a 10K race I decided to bring forward the rest day from Friday and take it off from running. Busy evening all the same with a coaches zoom meeting to plan for the next few months, normally we'd be training indoors this time of the year but we're going back outside for next month anyways...it might mean reduced numbers at training but we think it's a safer setup for all at the moment. Following that another zoom meeting with the committee for race planning, all coming together nicely which is great. We've got plenty of people lined up to help so should be a safe an enjoyable event for all. It's my first event as a run director so a learning curve but good team of people involved so we're getting there.

Thursday 06/01/2022

The weather has certainly taken a turn for the worse towards the end of the week. Bitter cold and a lot of hail throughout the day. I was looking at where I'd fit in my tempo run, it was only 35mins but I don't particularly enjoy doing sessions at lunchtime as you get to bathe in sweat afterwards despite taking a shower. I chanced leaving it until after work and hopefully get a break in the weather. Thankfully the weather gods played ball and I was out just before 6 and done by half 6...the hail stones just resumed as I was stepping back in the door. Winning! For the run itself, I am following the Hal Higdon intermediate 10K plan and they advise to structure the tempo run as the first 10-15mins easy and then first the next 10-15mins to get to race pace gradually, finish then with 5mins easy so that's what I aimed for. Splits of 5:34, 5:28, 5:17, 4:42, 4:22 (downhill), 4:37, 5:33 for the 7K I ran. Running tights were brought out due to air temp being around or below zero. Wouldn't normally wear them for such work but felt fine, I hate to be too warm.

Friday 07/01/2022

The week's rest day normally scheduled for Friday's but it looks to be the one day of the week for the moment I'll be able to meet up with some running friends so met them after work for an easy pace 5K around a local loop. Unreal weather down here today in the first half of the day, thunder and lightening during a hailstone storm that seemed to go off just above the house given the 1-2 second gap between the lightening and the sound. Biblical stuff it seemed.

Enjoying getting back into boards a little bit more in the last week or so, I'd hope this site is around for a long time to come. I was heavily involved with a fan forum in the early 2000's for a number of years, I think I had 10000 posts on it over the course of 3-4 years. That site is gone now and I do miss it plus the people that you'd interact with virtually and even occasionally in the real world.

Week 2

Monday 10/01/2022

5k easy on the plan so slotted this run in at lunchtime with an out and back run on the road. 5K in 28:42.

Tuesday 11/01/2022

6K easy scheduled for today, met up with a running mate in the evening time for a run in Ballyheigue using the line road. This particular road has long been used by myself for training but not all the locals like it for running. Not really sure why but I guess because it's not especially scenic, some decent mountain views though...I guess in comparison to other routes available you cannot see the sea...an it's probably at sea level also. It's often busy with agricultural traffic, you meet the odd lunatic driving some exceptional speeds on what is a bog road. The road has an interesting history, was built during the famine as a relief scheme so providing people with employment and I guess means to be able to buy food. It's an extremely straight road for the most part....for almost 13.5K before it curves for the last 3.5K. It runs parallel to the extremely windy main regional road that serves the area so I do wonder what the point of it's construction in the first place really was, hardly just to give employment. I guess to give access to farmland rather than lots of long lanes from the main road. Anyways it's a good road for easy training as it's flat, I also like it for speed sessions and time trials but you need to be careful with your timing to get a good run at it...sometimes with the vehicles you've not choice but to step off into the ditch. I think it's a good tester for marathon running as despite being flat it can be pretty tedious to be able to see kms in front of you as you trudge alone...so good for the brain training side of things to help development strategies when training does feel so good. I can recall doing a run from Tralee once training for DCM 2015 (my first marathon), having run 15K already to having to turn and another 10K+ plus home on a dead straight road. My legs were quite tired, I took pause for a few seconds at one end of the line road for a quick drink and then headed off on the line road. For some reason I can always remember how dead my quads felt that day and I can remember the run, it felt horrible for the most part but to me they are the most valuable runs of all. That was then, this is now 6K easy in 36:24.

Wednesday 12/01/2022

Speed session on the plan, 8x400m @ 5K pace.

Wednesday evening is my second night of the week for coaching (Monday is the other) so I will when possible get my runs done at lunchtime. Took a 10 minute warmup plus a few basic drills before getting into the intervals. Used my gps and some lampposts on my warm up to mark out a 400m that I ran up and down. Target pace for the 400s was 1:44. In the end they worked out as 1:41, 1:37, 1:39, 1:44, 1:41, 1:42, 1:37, 1:39. The recoveries taken were 1 minute which was enough to help my heart rate get down to the easy range again, I walked the recoveries with a small jog before starting the next interval. This was a tough enough but manageable workout. I find the pacing on these difficult to manage, I checked my watch around 200m in on the first few and just based the rest on the same effort. Felt very leggy on the last interval so not sure if I would have felt like doing another...small bit of tightness on right calf afterwards so have to careful. With a 5min cool down home, it was 7.5K in 42 minutes running. I noted on my strava, easy days easy and hard days hard. I've never had a problem pushing myself when it comes to intervals but it's the easy running I am focusing on to try keep it slow. Running on my own it's easy enough to do that but if I run with mates they have a tendency to run them a bit faster than I would like so I try factor that into my training to not those sort of runs that the day after a session.

Thursday 13/01/2022

Friday's scheduled rest day on the Thursday instead again. Final planning meeting this evening for the club's upcoming race on Sunday which I was run director for. We sold out the race the day previous but decided to allow some entries on the weekend but would have to post medals out to those people 1-2 weeks after the race. People seemed very happy with that. Difficult to plan for entries into a new race at a relatively uncommon distance (8K) and almost 50 percent of those who registered in the end signed up in the last week. We had to give a week's notice to our supplier to get extra medals.

Horrified to hear the news coming out of Tullamore about the murder of Ashling Murphy, my deepest sympathies to her family and friends. I always think the job of a teacher is an ideal job for a runner. Even during winter months usually finished work early enough to be able to get out and get your training done in daylight, notionally a safer thing to do but evidentially it is not a safe thing to do for a woman in this country. I rarely have to give too much thought about the safety of where/when I run, given I live in the countryside most of running is done alone, often in the dark for 1/3 of the year. Do I worry about being approached by a slowing car, van or random person. No I don't and it's clearly male privilege that I don't need to, we are rarely if ever the target. What a society we have created that one set of people are often targeted and victims of another set of people, for shame. I am not sure what can be done to change this, we have a problem but yet to find a solution...for Ashling Murphy and for the Ashling Murphy's of the future I hope we do.

Friday 14/01/2022

Easy run with some running mates down near Banna beach, 6.4K easy in 36:24. Talk dominated by events in Tullamore, talking about our respective wives. None of whom would go running alone, generally safety the main reason. It's a problem we are all aware of but rarely talk of how it can resolved. How can I convince my wife she safe out to go run a 5K loop in the locality on her own when events like this week happen, when she's heard hearsay of attempted abductions in years passed. Should she get into the care and drive 25mins to go into Tralee and to be able to go run around a town on her own or does she have to try link up with a mate working around another person's schedule? How do I know that she wouldn't get some helpful comments from some groups of young lads with nothing to do but just try be a smart a** in front of their mates. Doubt they care too much of their target's feelings. It's all part of the problem.

Saturday 15/01/2022

Tralee parkrun, 24:09....ran this a bit of a tempo run. Tried to help one of my younger clubmates break a pb but he dropped off to miss out by 12 seconds. He'll get it again soon. 1K warmup before and 1K afterwards. Like all parkruns it seems a minutes silence was held.

After that it was to pick up some extra supplies for the runners/walkers in the race tomorrow, another check on the course. We had some potholes filled during the week and then home for the day to take it handy. Expecting an early night I was still up till 1am working on my pre race briefing. Had got a message from a runner who required a vi guide (and a lift to/from the race) after he had a drop out. Managed to get it sorted for him with a club mate stepping up to the plate to do it.

Sunday 16/01/2022

Early start as up just after 6am, race start was due to 9:30am but a few things to do and check on before the inaugural Tom Kelly 8K. First thing to do when I got to Ardfert was to go drive the course to check for any issues...all was good. After that it was checking on the finish area which one of our local committee members had already got in place. I had said I'd be there at 7:30am to do it. He was talking about doing it at 6am and I said no need. If I had said 6am, he would have said 5am. Sometimes you just have to let people get on with it and he did a good job. Main work that had to be done in the end there for me was clearing the area of leaves and gunk from leaves to make sure the ground was not slippy. Next to go check on the water station to see all in order. Back then to see how the registrations/number collections were going. We'd advertised that number collection would finish at 9am but you will always get last minute people rushing in. I think 9:15 was the last number collected. 180 entrants in total (150 online) and the rest in person. Delighted with the turnout as when planning the event we thought maybe 100 runners. 170 people toed the line as well which was an excellent percentage of those who signed up to be there. Got a last minute call before my briefing at 9:20 with a marshal issue but got that sorted. 9:20ish I stood in front of runners and gave the briefing, I cut some sections on it just not to stall things too long but made sure to include a moments silence for Aishling Murphy who was just out for a run. It was an honor to be able to do this and to offer thanks to Kelly family who supported the event as soon as it was proposed to them. They stood at the start line and joined us at the finish line for the presentations to the winners.

At approx 9:32 the race started and 25:55 minutes later the first male finisher crossed the line, the first female finisher crossed the line in 33:11. Both are now deemed the course records.

Here is a picture from the race start, I am very proud of my club to have setup and ran such a brilliant race. The feedback from all participants has been brilliant and Tom's family were delighted with it. Lots of coverage with the local media and one of my club mates was on local radio last night interviewed about the man for whom the race was created in memory of and about the club. I wanted to us to create a quality event that could become an established race fixture on the calendar and it seems like with one go it will be, we look forward to the Tom Kelly 8K in January 2023.

Was very much on a high after the whole event with how well it went, few bits to do when I got home so didn't get out until after 6pm. 8K easy in 46:07 @ 5:42min/km. Clear, cold night with a full moon, joked with my wife when I got home that in that sort of weather I could run for hours. I do get funny looks from her occasionally.

39.9K for the week.

99.4K for the year so far.

In North Kerry you would get a few stretches here but line road would be pretty unique for it's length. Certainly after learning to run alone the canal in Sallins coming down here was a change. Most runs I do these days I get to run up a nice short sharp hill for the last 200m to my door....just in case you didn't get a hill to run already!

Thanks very much, nice to hear that word has spread. Majority of the runners we had were from Kerry but quite a few from Cork which was nice....so word should spread and help grow the event. You would be very welcome, bring a friend!

Thanks very much AM, It was just nice seeing all come to fruition as took a good few months work. Next year should be easier in ways as we've done it once now!

Week 4

Monday 24/01/2022

5K easy on the plan but my hip was a bit stuff/sore so took a rest day instead. Did some mobility work on it and definitely helped, the pigeon pose seems to work well for me and I can actually do it decent enough so just need to bring that into stretches and that helps.

Tuesday 25/01/2022

7.3K on the plan but given the missed day yesterday I just did 5K easy after work on a out and back route. Stopped before the small bit of a hill near the end just to keep it on the flat as much as possible. 5K in 27:40 @ 5:31min/km. My daughter was back to school today after her missing all the previous week due to covid, my wife was pretty much in of the clear also barring a bit of a cough. I managed to avoid so far myself so we'll see when it comes back around again!

Wednesday 26/01/2022

Weekly speed session on for today but still easing into the week so decided to carry it over for another day and do another easy run. 6K easy in 32:48 @ 5:27min/km during my lunchtime. Still the little bit of a hip issue but nothing that some stretching isn't help address so far so good. Back to coaching tonight as well, great numbers attending training so real buzz to the start of the year for the club. We've an athletics match coming up next Saturday against another club in the county so we just have to get the numbers to that which is always a challenge for any form of competitive event.

Thursday 27/01/2022

So a bit of stick or twist with the week, after reading a comment about plans on Babacool's log earlier in the week I was thinking just do the speed session and see how it goes. The plan had for 9x400 @5K pace, 1min recoveries. Left it till after work, so 15min warmup plus a few drills and dynamic stretching. Target pace of 1:44 for the 400m using the same pretty flat section of the road to run each rep up and then down. First one down, 1:42...very happy with that as it felt controlled. Now do it again...1:41 on the slightly slower return leg, watch the pace. 1:43 for the 3rd, took a few seconds to stretch a bit after this but glad this were feeling good...was sure about 9 of them but would stay going for now, 1:42 for the 4th...sure we're nearly halfway there...do two more and see. 1:41 for the 5th...think I'm actually starting to enjoy these despite my light giving up the ghost on it's charge but only 10mins or so running left to do, 1:43 for the 6th....still all good, only 3 to go so gonna see this out, 1:42 for the 7th....wish I didn't have the bit of a hip niggle as otherwise it's all still good, 1:41 for the 8th....yup feeling a bit more of the effort now but one to go, facing for home and off to the 9th....1:35 after hitting the button at 0.39KM but still very happy with that session. 5min jog home, 8K in 46mins.

Friday 28/01/2022

Rest day was on the plan here but having taken a rest day earlier in the week and the chance to run with a mate I said I'd go with the run. I did say starting off if it was okay we'd be averaging probably 6min/K, that suited us both which was great. 5K easy in 29:35 @ 5:55min/km.

Saturday 29/01/2022

Back to Tralee parkrun today, One of the young athletes (C) in my club came up to me at the startline and asked me could he run with me and I said of course. He's too fast for him mum at the moment, only 8 so has to run with an adult and I think he wanted to try for his pb. He was recently running with a guy who runs around 26mins normally. I asked him what his pb was, he said 25 something...he wasn't sure...I wasn't either so I said we'll try for 24 something if that sounded okay so that was the plan. Said to him we'd line up nicely a few rows back from the front but he wasn't to go sprinting off at the start. All good and off we went on our mission and he was spot on at the start, no crazy weaving or anything which I was happy with as often see that with young kids. Due to unreliable GPS i just pace per lap (like Donadea 50K back in 2018), so for Tralee parkrun it's 3 laps of even length. Just checked in with him every few mins to see how he was and giving encouragement, keeping an eye on effort/breathing, all good. First lap was 8:06 so I said to my young charge we are all good and no need to go any faster over this second lap. Told him we just keep going as we are and we can go a bit faster on the 3rd lap if we want. Very impressed with his ability to run the distance without needing to stop and walk at any point. He just kept on my shoulder the whole way around or maybe dropped 1-2 seconds behind me. Coming to the end of the second lap I checked the watch and it said 16 something...can't recall so I told him we are still all good here now just keep it going for one last lap. At this point we were lapping some of the walkers so he got a nice cheer going by from them. We came up to another person who was guiding a visually impared runner, also going for sub 25 so we had company over some of the second half of the last lap and we seemed to jockey for position a bit. Giving encouragement to both of our runners we were helping out. Into the last 500/600m I was edging C to move ahead of me to take it on, I told him two mins running left and we're on the downhill part. He kept it nice and controlled and picked it up slightly, 1 minute to go...I said to C time to push it now if you can...he took it on...now I'm just the passenger and he drives all the way to the line passing 1-2 people enroute. 24:35 for him and 24:37 for me, delighted for the chap. We met some more clubmates then and he was getting great congrats for fine run, his mum came in 6/7 mins later so she was very happy to hear how he got on. I found out afterwards that his previous best was 25:23 so that was a great time for him to take that much time off. The last time I paced a clubmate like this was for a clubmate who in his mid 60's, and like that day today is now filed away as one of my favourite parkrun moments.

1K warm up before, 24:37 for the parkrun and 1K cool down afterwards.

Did a small bit of throws practice when I got home, I'll probably do some terrible shot putting and weight for distance next Sunday in Munster indoors. I seem to be able to throw the implements as far as I have previous so least I've not regressed!

Sunday 30/01/2022

The plan has a race in for this weekend but given the week passed I decided I'd leave the race to the actual race at the end of Feb. I might do a local 10 miler a long run in a few weeks but will seeing to the date. So for today a group run with some running mates. Bit lazy getting up to go do this, 9am is not an early start but wasn't really feeling it. I was awake anyways so just got up and put on my gear before I made a proper decision either way. Glad I did as it was a nice run using my clubs 10K race route and good chats enroute, 11K in 59:42 @ 5:28min/km. Next few weekends likely to be business with Munster indoors competition across all the various age groups so probably won't make weekend group runs.

42K for the week.

181.5K for the year so far.

Thanks, it's nice to be able to do it, in a few years he'll no doubt be leaving me behind for dust! He was delighted with himself but tired, he was heading off to a cafe with his mom then for some treats. I was telling him that he can't be trying for a pb next week, the young kids have amazing powers of recovery but I do suggest going for a pb maybe once a month or else you just get burnt out I think.

Thanks on the 400s, they're working nicely for speed work at the moment!