Training Log Archive: ToddO

Coughed a fair bit yesterday and was clearing some thick phlegm today still. Hopefully just the hard run yesterday loosening old stuff.
Past Househole (normal pace), onto the footpath at Scalegill, across the fileds to the road, up through High Walton and Loughrigg, onto the path, through St Bees, along the valley to Stanley Pond, across the fields to Low Hall and home.
Quads a bit sore from yesterday and the L) lat hamstrings twinged a bit.
Good stretch out afterwards.

30x eccentric Achilles

Ran the first part of the course with Tom Edwards then did a couple of stride-outs on the parking field.

New Dungeon Ghyll Fell race. 5.6km, 640m climb
Set off at the front at a pace that wasn't too ambitious. Jamie Luxmore went past before we left the wall. Held off Phil Winskill and some guy in a purple singlet (not Borrowdale or NFR) for a little while but they were in front of me after the first steep part gave way to a gentler grass slope. Tom was a little bit back. Got back to running on the grass and overhauled the guy in purple as the track became stone and gravel again.
Jamie has been overtaken by Phil and was less than 20m in front of me. Did a fair bit of scrambling on the last climb to CP1. It was much more of a traverse than the map had led me to believe but even so this was where my quads were starting to hurt. When the path turned into a nice track to the CP I reeled in Jamie a bit and we started the final ascent to Harrison Stickle with about 5m vertically from Jamie to me and then even gaps down to the guy in purple and Tom.
We 4 were cutting the corner whilst Phil stuck to the path so we decreased his lead. Jamie opened up some space on me and we were at the top before I expected. I came onto the plateau in time to see Phil standing still pointing and talking to the marshall at the cairn! He let Jamie catch him and they set off down 50m in front of me.
i made a dent in that as soon as we hit the mossy descent. It was steep and after a couple of near wipe-outs I eased back and had the same gap to Jamie (and Phil bang inbetween) when we hit CP3 above Stickle Tarn.
By this point I had missed the 2 good lines that local knowledge tells of: a cut on the initial climb and some scree off the top. This time though I saw that Jamie was climbing to go around the top of the crags and I went below... this was the faster way but I didn't gain any ground after dithering a bit because I was worried I'd gone below CP4.
Tom came flying down the spur to my right and I knew I was going to have to get silly. Having been at a pace with, if not faster than, Jamie and Phil I had been thinking I could overhaul then on the final descent.
Everyone got loose though and we a had a 3 man battle for 2nd. Tom and I were nice and reckless down the steep, rocky, mossy and bracked-obscured slope just before the path to the finish. He got in front of me just before the bottom but he was careering across me into a rocky area as I headed straight to the grassy shute. After a hundred metres of "nice" running on grass and path (with only a couple of dangerous jumps) I was pretty sure I'd dropped Tom. Skinniness can help you on the way up, attitude can help on the way down but on the flat it all comes down to fitness... and he'd already told me he hadn't been training much!
I never got in front of Phil but got to within 2m at the very end. I was sprinting down the road past the pub and gaining steadily but the final hair=pin into the finish field was the final straw.

1st Jamie 39:30ish
2nd Pjil 40:05
3rd me a second behind
4th Tom, maybe 40:12
Time would've been faster if any of us at the front knew some better lines! apparently Mike Robinson knows them all.

Results 2011
1 Robert Jebb 38:18
2 Mike Robinson V40 39:30
3 Andrew Schofield V40 41:01
4 Thomas Edwards 41:55

Results 2010
1 Mike Robinson V40 39:43
2 Sam Watson 40:43
3 Rhys Findlay-Robinson 43:46

Much the same warm-down with Tom with a stop to take in the idiotic final descent we went down and then a wash in the beck.

Up Pike of Blisco from Three Shires Stone. The actual walk from Red Tarn took 11:30.
Had nipped into Ambleside and then talked to Ben and Gary (back at the event car-park) about Great Lakes routes. Meanwhile pairs were finishing the Old Counties Tops race (won in over 7 hours) so I drove past plenty of pairs as I drove up to Wrynose Pass.

Nice and clear up on Pike of Blisco so had a good look at the view and tried to work out if it was possible to get off to the north.
Ran the SE line off before swooping round to the track then headed back to the car over the spur to the S of the peak.

30x eccentric Achilles

Good stretch out afterwards

30x eccentric Achilles

To Holehouse and back.

C • Hi, hwat are your plans for... 3

30x eccentric Achilles.
Good stretch out afterwards.

Short jog around before the long steep walk to the start. Jogged about for more than 5 mins afterwards.

Tried going hard from the start. Legs not feeling quick though. Little miss at 14.
Lost ~2 mins on number 3. Just switched off after having got the worst climb out of the way.
Missed number 2.
Hestated at number 10 before realising it was in the boulders.
12 was on the ground in the bracken so I lost some time just not being able to see it from less than 50m away.
Should've been under 40. Good work-out though due to the high vis terrain. Never felt particularly fast today.

30x eccentric Achilles

Need to add stuff from O-ringen and POM still!

Same as Saturday evening past Low Hall. Stiff breeze on the way back.

30x eccentric Achilles.
Good stretch out afterwards.

Seems like the cold is pretty much gone now.

2% grade as per usual. Not feeling too bad in the legs. Was a bit drained though. Tiny twinges in the L) lat hamstring.
Good stretch out afterwards.

30x eccentric Achilles