Training Log Archive: shabar

"My mind is telling me yes, but my body, my body's telling me no" - or something. Feeling pretty good all things considered, enjoyed a spring like run out in the evening sunshine with Rach, and chucked in a cheeky 10 min controlled effort up Porter. However, heavy legs, tight calves, weird right hip, sore right quad, and struggles with sleep and stress meanI think it's time to experiment with a ten day taper. This weekend's a write off anyway, though I'll try and run off the hangovers with a couple of gentle ones. Next week I'm going to do another short tempo tues and maybe hit the grass for some easy 200s or 300s with lots of recovery thurs, as a last minute sharpener, but might do that tuesday instead and ditch the tempo....

Recovery pace round the school playing fields. Head utterly scrambled with work. Running didn't help.

Legs really feeling it today - took ages to warm up but some strides seemed to sort things out a bit. Went off too fast on the first one as usual, struggled for power in the steep section past the gate on 2nd and 3rd. 4th to the gate as Hazel and Steve were calling it a day although I was heading backwards rapidly anyway. Blast up the Blackmoor ford climb to finish. Dismayed how quick Steve came past on the top section, when I really dug in! Long way to go on the hills still. Next couple of months are all about the hill reps.

Driving home and taking it easy

Amazing the difference, proper fuel, a better warm up and easing off the pace by 30seconds per mile makes. This felt great and a nice loose cruise. 2 miles to warm up then eased up to 8 miles a high aerobic tempo, but never pushing it. 2.5 miles to cool down. Calves tight but otherwise good. Nice wildlife and top birding too. Smashing

Mis-timed with the weather!

Terrible effort. Couple of reasons. 1) eating "healthily" last night with a salmon salad with no carbs then a hard effort pre breakfast. Felt hypoglycemic towards the end of this. 2) 5.55 first mile uphill. Way over LT and far too much of an effort, esp after just the mile warm up first thing.

Thereafter it was a question of gritting the teeth and holding on, with pace inexorably deteriorating. Fingers crossed that while the physical results of this session might not be ideal, it will have helped toughen me up a bit mentally!

Legs utterly spamdrangled. Head all over the place too with work stuff. Not the best run but nice to get out in a lovely sunset with owls, lambs and cherry blossom. I like spring!

Trying to prepare for Sheff 1/2 with some knee-busting shallow downhill efforts. 4x1600. Totally overcooked it on the first 2, hanging on for the second 2. Diaphram/ribs seemed limiting factor weirdly. Guess that's a core thing from back arching or something. Anyway great fun running fast, shame it was gravity assisted!

5.12, 4.56, 5.22, 5.31

Wow, legs seem to have a lot more in them than they did in the autumn... Much higher gear than normal. I have the power (and thighs) of a demi-god. Should have taken the watch!

Late start due to pie consumption, rugby, football and beers last night. Gentle stroll over Place Fell from Patterdale taking a leisurely 4 hours or so to cover 6 or 7 miles. David nursing his elderly knees. Another stunning day. Top off for power at one point. Nice to walk up a hill I'd not been on before - fantastic views of Helvellyn and the IMHR route. Legs sore following the drive home.

10 hours walking round the Borrowdale fell race route with David at a relaxed pace (stops for sandwiches etc). Legs still pretty sore by the end despite using poles. Had to jog the downhills towards the end to make it easier on the quads. Stunning day with some snow on the tops, but warm and spring like lower down. Fairly empty apart from the seething hive of humanity that is Scafell Pike. It's not that I have anything against large numbers of people enjoying the fells, I'm all for it, it's just that a) it would be great if people thought outside of the box a bit and b) they didn't litter everywhere (a small minority) and c) they didn't enjoy the fells at the same time I'm trying to enjoy the fells! ;)

It's about time I started making systematic use of the resource that is Highcliffe road, as it's literally on my doorstep. The plan is to hit this once or twice a week through to the end of April/start of May, to give me a good base of quality hill strength and speed, before mixing it up once the fell season begins. Toyed with the idea of using Pipers but it's just a bit too far away. We'll see how it goes. Kicked off today with 5 reps. Plan is to see if I can do the reps a bit quicker on average next week - if not - stick at 5, if so, add in another one and so on. One or possibly two of these a week. Other session in the week will be downhill orientated, eg downhill miles or a tempo with some downhill sections. Only planning on doing 3 of these downhill sessions max in the next month. Once the summer starts I think racing will probably cover the downhill stuff.

Times today were 3.44, 3.47, 3.56, 3.56, 3.44.

Pleased with the consistency, though felt like I stepped it up a notch for the 5th rep.

Massage

Into Cambridge and back

Shake out round the baulk - started steady and finished with a bit of a tempo and gave it some back over the meadows. Not feeling at all quick at the moment. Feel like a couple of 200 or 400 sessions would come in handy

Legs feeling loads better but still heavy. Decided against planned tempo. As a wise man once said; "21 miles is a long way.... especially if you're not conditioned for it". Best to ease back into it rather than rush.

ITB tightening up towards the end. Engine felt fine but legs ruined.

16th

Mixed feelings about this but overall very much on the positive side. In fact I'd go so far as to say this was one of my favourite, most enjoyable races. The mixed feelings come more from the interrupted build up in the last few weeks and the feeling that there's lots of room for improvement at this distance.

In fact given my 3 races of this length (or longer) so far, I'm really pleased. Worth me remembering that this is the first time a long race hasn't ended in disaster! 2014 Edale Skyline, biggest bonk of all time, walked the last third losing 150 plus places in the process. Lousy preparation in retrospect. 2013 Exterminator. Got lost, medium bonk lost 50 plus places in last 5 miles. 2012 OMM. Unwise agreement to be a last minute replacement in the elite course. Next to no preparation resulted in a DNF and itb issues that lasted months. Not a great track record.

So in that context, today was a great success. 21 miles at a fairly even pace and , fingers crossed, no lasting damage to the legs.

Followed the plan fairly well. Set off slow, bottle necked a bit and as a result first mile went by in about 8 minutes. However I really enjoyed chatting to people, including a student i used to teach and slowly working my way through the field. By the top of Longstone moor I was moving well and dropped a 5.40 downhill before stomach cramp slowed me a bit. Onto the Monsall trail I started to move freely again and made good time. By Hassop I was on my own in about the right place in the field.

Out of Bakewell I could see Dunc ahead and forced myself not to get too excited. reined myself in a bit up the hill feeling strong. Over the top and down to Edensor I was glad I did as the first twinges of cramp made themselves known. A minor route finding issue and a "disagreement" with a rude passer by at this stage were probably good indicators of tiredness. Sure enough into Chatsworth and glute med and left hamstring decided they'd had enough. I had to stop and stretch a number of times along this section and lost a place as a result. Gave myself the option of dropping out at Baslow but once we were heading uphill again the legs felt better. At this stage a kind cyclist gave me their water bottle and told me to drop it on the trail when I'd done with it. What a legend!

Past the eaglestone and I knew I'd finish. leg cramps meant about 8 min miles along the top and I lost another place but gained one back. Better conditioning, esp of glute med would have really helped here and somewhere near froggatt I promised myself to do more work on them. The gels and fatigue messed a bit with my head here but I kept smiling and with a few shouts of "come on legs,do your stuff" I held it together until the road and the final sprint over the bridge. With no one to catch or be caught by, my "kick" resulted in an embarrassing final pause to stretch with a load of heckling 50 metres from the finish line. By now glute med had ceased to function at all and my knees were flying about all over the place. Clear weakness to target.

But all said and done, I'd made it round in a reasonable time and in a respectable part of the field. I've also got some more ideas about preparation for longer races and where my body needs a boost. With tougher races later in the year this is a great opportunity to work on these a bit and become a more rounded runner, rather than a one trick pony who only shows up in 5/6 mile races.

Was going to do hill reps but decided too close to the Gallop so basically just went out to enjoy myself at a jaunty pace. Enjoyed this a lot, slightly worried by right knee and tight tensor fascia latae. Did a lot of thinking about this years goals on the way round, think I've concluded the following;

- Although I can't do all of them, my "A" races are the English Champs. I'm under no illusions that I'll be anywhere in the top 50, but somewhere in the top 100 for each race would be good. I have no idea how I'll get on in the longer, rougher ones (ie Borrowdale and Langdale) but those are the ones I'm looking forward to most, and need to get in shape for most.

- "B" races are Totley club champs. Think I have a decent chance here as I doubt Steve, Ollie and Dan will do enough races on past form, and Aidan and I are fairly evenly matched. Sam's also been running well this winter so he'll be in there too. Some of the races are properly esoteric too so you never know, there might be a chance of a very rare win or podium in some of them? Then there are some of the road races that might become "A" races in a bit of a pb hunt in the autumn. Would be delighted with as close to 16 as possible in a flat 5k, as close to 34 as possible in a flat 10k, and sub 1.20 for a half this year. Sheffield 1/2 unlikely to be that given how hilly it is and how soon after my stag-do it is, but you never know.

- "C" races are the usual local ones, ( it would be good to do a few I've not done before, like Castleton, Edale or Salt Cellar) and any further afield that appeal on the spur of the moment.

So the Gallop is definitely a "C" race, and one I'm a bit wary of. The competitive side of me wants to place high, and beat a few characters along the way. I'm certain this is the wrong approach. Bottom line is that I've not raced this distance without blowing up before, either through injury or bonking. So aim number one is get round in one piece, and with a bit of confidence to take into the Sheffield 1/2 and Borrowdale later in the year. I'm also aware that my preparation has gone totally tits up thanks to getting ill a couple of weeks ago.

The plan therefore is to start off low stress. I won't worry about the bottlenecks early on, but use them instead to force me into starting sensibly. That way I can (hopefully) "be the hunter, not the hunted" (Franklin. S 2015) and pick people off later in the race. Take on calories every 5 miles and fluid every checkpoint, and only start ramping it up from a comfortable pace once I'm past Bakewell. That's the plan anyway, we'll see how well I stick to it!

Still not feeling great, but at least this didn't hurt. Mod with a bit of an effort up one of the hills in the Mayfield, and a bit of controlled speed down Ringinglow Road (very muddy so never that fast). Lousy weather. R groin tightened up towards the end.

Legs feeling it after yesterday, and still a bit tired but feeling so much better than I have been. Thanks Scotland! Usual monday of London and back.

Tour of Meall Garbh and Meall nan Tarmachan in the Ben Lawers range. On my own so conservative route choices. No-one about until about 11. Much better snow than yesterday, cracking views and amazing weather. In a t shirt and rolled up trousers for the more sheltered ups; all felt nicely alpine!

Tough grind up to Creag an Socach with a ludicrous pack due to ambitious decision to carry both climbing and ski touring kit. Snow line at about 600 meters so carrying all the way until there, dumping skis shortly after and carrying on up to the route. Just included the walking time here as the climbing, although strenuous doesn't feel like training for running (though might help a bit with S&C), but the walking uphill (and downhill on the way out) certainly did! Time therefore estimate of both walk-in and walk-out

From where we dumped our bags around 600m to the West top of Beinn and Dothaidh and back. The up was more fun than the down thanks to a horrible heavy and sticky crust.

Long day travelling to Glasgow and then to Bridge of Orchy

I've never felt as bad as that on a run. Rach dropped me 3 times. I felt completely empty energy wise and at times thought I was going to fall asleep despite a good 8/9 hours last night. Also felt quite emotional! Think last week's travel and illness has destroyed me. Due to go winter climbing /skiing this weekend so will have to manage energy/food intake carefully if I'm not going to exhaust myself completely.

Well that was a shit week of training! Back into it gently. Plan is to keep intensity low til after Grindleford, maybe one session tues or weds next week. Certainly not in any shape to do myself justice at Grindleford so will probably aim to treat it like a long training run.