Training Log Archive: rcro

Event: Summer Street Challenge
 

NGOC street o from Newent school. Tired legs. Guest appearance from Ben so had to at least try to make it hard for him to beat me.

Fairly straightforward course and similar in many ways to mine from last year. Enough familiarity that was more running between points rather than map reading - but did get down a few different alleys at least.

Lost a minute at 10 - looking for a plate on a tree in a clump of trees. Another 2 mins or so at 11 as navigated to correct place - no control, and spent a bit of time looking around shoulder deep nettles (wearing vest and shorts!) before giving up and moving on. Control was some way the other way.

Rest was straightforward (for me). Think got route right on 17 - barring almost running down a dead end before remembering (didn't need map), and hesitant on 25 as looking for plate on tree when it was actually kite in undergrowth.

Nice evening to be out. Hope that next time we come here the courses are planned to be very different from previous.

https://www.strava.com/activities/596533152

Well done to rickyp and Bob for spotting the "deliberate" mistake on the map.

Jogging around collecting controls around lake. Gripple fighting is much easier when it's two against one.

https://www.strava.com/activities/596533103

Event: Summer Park Series 2
 

jog from Central station to Victoria Park.

Checked google maps and got distance as 2.2km. Stopped after 2.3km to check phone to find still had some way to go. Pretty tired legs - and quite hot for running.

https://www.strava.com/activities/595424646

Second in SWOC urban series. Pretty tired out.

First bit in Victoria Park helped out by seeing where Marcus went.

Long leg to 6 - into Thomson Park - probably not the best route as didn't see gap in south fence(!) - looking for gap between road and grass so completely missed the path in the middle. Suppose the route I took wasn't very bad, but not the best.

Long, long wait for traffic crossing into Llandaf Fields and just didn't have the legs for the straight running across the grass. OK rest of the way but definitely flagging on drag back to Victoria Park.

Any faster would have been a struggle - but did well to be ahead of Mark P and Gary. 5 mins behind Marcus still quite a lot for a 5k(ish...) straight line course.

Do like the SWOC approach of keeping it simple and informal - enjoyable run and seems to be doing ok at attracting new people in, without a huge drag on volunteers.

https://www.strava.com/activities/595424643

MDC run from Whistle.

Started by following race route up before detouring down and around southern side. Fairly tough climbs for tired legs both times.

As wanted to do more than 10k, went off with faster runners around Big Pit and then onto Pwll Du - flagging a lot by now so skirted around the slag heaps rather than over. Wise decision.

Nice route, and decent food in pub after.

https://www.strava.com/activities/594430156/overvi...

Woke up early, so went out for a jog whilst slightly cooler.

Legs feeling quite tired from yesterday, but not terribly so.

https://www.strava.com/activities/592733115

"Flagged" an activity on strava for the first time ever. Not 100% convinced a lady ran 12.3km in 8:37 on Thursday night, nor do I think Strava should be encouraging people to run on motorways (Tim Longley excluded...)

If Tommi logs it...

Been trying to get into habit again this weekend as had been quite sporadic since knee injury in Feb.

Loop from Stanway to check out bottom half of Leg 1. Very very hot - really struggling to cope yet "only" 21/22C.

First 2k as per leg 2 up the hill then following other footpaths and roads to top of Fish Hill. Quite quickly got caught out by unhelpful landowners and little strip of wood was overgrown with bramble and nettle, and then crossed stile to find path had been completely planted over. Tried going around until it became impossible and had to backtrack back over stile and through adjacent field to get out to road.

Couple of hundred off road motorbikers riding down the green lane I ran up from Taddington.

Nice descent from Broadway Tower. Less nice was all the snobs and arseholes in Broadway itself. It's only a village - nothing special! Yet more than half I ran past went out of their way to block my path and force me over kerbs and boulders.

Started to burn out on climb out - but was on about 19k and 380m climb so same as leg length/climb. Turn at farm confusing so good to reccee - and then up against another couple of hundred off road motobikers from here to top.

Very pleased to get back to the car. Further than I really wanted to be running today and struggling.

Saw a kite whilst climbing up hill from Broadway, and another just after Monmouth on the drive home.

https://www.strava.com/activities/591833281

Note - it's a (very) long drive from home to do by 6.15am...

Managed to get old laptop working for long enough for me turn on file sharing - so now able to copy files across as and when I need - so long as before the system freezes

Newport Parkrun. Original plan was FoD followed by CWR reccee - but realised latter would be over 20km so decoupled. Suppose it's the purpose of Parkrun to have something local to go to - to get me out running when otherwise I wouldn't have known what to do with myself.

After 2 races mid week, today's aim was to pace 20:30. After getting stuck in traffic on first straight then knew was just a case of running as fast as I was able for the remainder - and was about right.

Very hot and sticky this morning. Despite the huge rain storm last night, course was pretty dry, and no convenient "lake" for me to run through to overtake tose who skirted around.

Had been toying with idea of doing another run in afternoon but managed to talk myself out of it.

https://www.strava.com/activities/591116974

Only 551 finishers today - but it felt quite busy. In two minds with the new Riverfront Parkrun starting at some point - it may be marginally closer but less my sort of thing, and I quite like the big crowds this one gets.