Rob's Running Blog

10 Mile Long Run – 01:31:49 – PB!

Nice long 10 mile run on a hot and sunny day. Wanted to run it at a decent pace instead of just jogging along easily as I have been lately, and managed a 10 mile PB by 2 minutes – and did it 10 minutes faster than my last effort and faster than recent long runs in general, and only stopped once to eat a gel. Felt like a drink in the later stages but resisted the temptation to have a shop stop but kept going, and tried to gradually speed up the harder things got, rather than petering out like I normally do. Still felt fresh at 12k though the last couple of k’s were hard and was overheating in the sun at times. Not a bad run at all though, ended up in central Manchester, went past the gay carnival thing, and got the bus home.

Splits for my k’s were:

5:39
5:48
6:05
5:56
5:52
5:54
5:40
5:41
5:39
6:09 (gel stop/slow)
5:38
5:24
5:24
5:25
5:43 (struggling with pedestrians!)
5:11 (clear road and a sprint!)

Tempo Run – Through Windmill Lane & Reddish – 01:03:33

For a while, building in more easy runs seemed to help my improvements, and slowing down the pace of long runs. But then the improvements stopped, and a good friend with a lot of running experience suggested running some longer runs at a harder pace. So I did a 12.1k effort today, with no reference to time, just ran how I felt – felt I was going at race pace at points, but refused to check out the time. Turns out I wasn’t going hugely fast, but I did go through the 10k split in 52:21 – so faster than Sunday’s race, and by that point I was at death’s door, but forced myself to go through another 2k at the best pace I could manage, and managed the 12.1k in 1:03:33, which is almost exactly the same time I did the same distance last time round – several months ago, and I found it easier back then… So something has gone wrong!

In actuality I think doing the easy runs has harmed my mental toughness. I can see that occasionally running a week where most of the running is easy will help – but I read an article that said 90% of your running should be at easy pace. Well I’ve tried that, and it seems to be load of tosh  Harder runs ahead then, the stopping feels nicer though

5k Recovery run, very easy pace – 31:36

Just a very easy paced recovery run after Sunday’s torment in the Birchwood 10k!!!

Birchwood 10k 2009 Race Report

My training’s been going well and I had given myself a relatively easy running week in preparation for the race, so was confident of good things. Didn’t get much sleep the night before, really, but was up bright and early and made my way off to Oxford Road station, where I duly caught the train to Birchwood. Things were a little different last year; then, I used the toilets in the train station, until eventually they decided too many runners were using the facilities and pretended they were out of order. This time, the toilets were “closed for cleaning” when I got there and still closed when I left. Additionally, I remember the actual shopping centre being open when I got there last year, at least to walk around and use the toilets in Asda, but it was shut up by the looks of it – maybe the recession. So it was the portaloos or bust

Anyway, on the way to join the queue for the portaloo I saw Dawn and Neil so I waved and went over, and was introduced to Ashley, one of Dawn’s daughters, who was going to do the fun run. We chatted and then went off to catch the fun run, which involved a bit of a stroll out to the finish line at the other side of the area. All the younger runners did really well and Ashley did fantastically

Then it was time to make the portaloo queue this time, and then do a warm up, although the line was so long, my warmup ended up being a bit curtailed, and ended up being a jogged 1.5k instead of a few jogs and walks, but by that point there was only 5 minutes left till the start. I lined up, and then the horn went, and we were off!

Probably, with hindsight, I set off far too quickly. I remember thinking all the people in front of me were going quite slowly and was dashing around a bit to overtake. I did the first k in 4:51 but may have done the first half of that at twice the pace. I didn’t get near that pace again, maintained roughly sub 10 pace up till about 5k, but then by the drinks station I knew I was in trouble when I needed to take double water (stealing, I know, apologies!) and stop to drink it.  I was wilting after that and when the inclines over the motorway came I had just about had it!  I stopped about a K from the end and this bloke tapped me on the arm and said come on not far to go now, and it got me going again, in fact I went ahead of him until I ran out of steam near the end and loads came flying past me. I saw Neil in the finishing straight, and more or less limped to the finish line in a final time of 52:35.  Of course all the info above is with the benefit of hindsight, I had the Garmin set to show only the distance and time of day, but it was tempting to look at the time of day and work out my potential time from the start time, so next time I will keep all trace of time off the display, though I think it was more to do with possibly humidity, or just my recent training catching up with me at the wrong time

But all’s well that ends well.  I saw Dawn come in and finish and found her, then we found Neil and Ashley, and then this lady collared us for some free finishing photos courtesy of http://www.absoluterunning.com/ All the people in the pics ran really well on the day and it was good to see everyone

The results are below, with a nice group photo, together with us doing some mad Usain Bolt arrow posings, Neil would have had my eye out if it hadn’t been for the shades

Nice slow easy 5k Run

Nice very easy paced run. Lower legs were aching and twingeing a little bit from recent high mileage, so decided to make this last run before Birchwood 10k on Sunday. Race Report will follow

5 Mile Tempo Run – 44m 10s

Tempo run – finding these definitely work better with a slow couple of k’s warm up so managed not to blow up this time!

Did 2k at slow 6/k pace, then aimed to run between 5 and 5:20 per k, managed to stay around 5:07 so was running comfortably but actually not far outside PB pace and certainly inside 51 minute 10k pace – so flat out with race adrenaline etc, who knows what may now be possible. Sub 50 seems inevitable on Sunday now, but am not counting the chickens yet.

Today will be my last hard run before the race – a few easy runs with a few strides is all I plan to to do, and hopefully the intervals I’ve been doing, the long runs and general mileage will pay off and get me a result but I intend to just enjoy it whatever the time

8.5k Jog/Easy Run

Ran reverse woods route on way to drop off form to finance adviser about increasing pension contributions… Was a flying visit, pleasant enough evening but a threat of rain in the air.

Nice easy paced run mainly on trails in the woods, averaged 6:17/k so nice and slow but that included a stop and a walk up lots of steps near the waterfall. Feet (toes) are a bit sore but otherwise legs and lungs responding fine.

Rounded off a high mileage week (20m) – upped a little from last week, so piling them up now – will have a quieter week with the Birchwood 10k next Sunday.

Speedwork – 400m intervals – progress!

First proper speedwork session and the results were interesting:

2k warm up

8x400m at

1:35
1:36
1:52 (uphill section)
1:35
1:37
1:47 (uphill)
1:30
1:38

with 3 minute walking recoveries

2k cool down.

Means I averaged 6:36/mile for the 2 miles, obviously with breaks, but if I can run 1:30 for a quarter of a mile it means with some work I should be able to get to 3:00 for half a mile, then 6:00 (or 5:59) for a mile! I have the speed, and with more intervals and I can find the endurance. Cool down felt nice and easy, legs were tightening a bit but lungs felt fine. Enjoyed being able to just go flat out then rest. Then flat out again. Got pace per k down to 3:44/k which is starting to seriously motor for me – the only trouble is at that pace it’s more tricky to avoid prams, bikes, pedestrians and car doors opening suddenly in front of you!!!

Easy 8 Miler – 1:19:22

Nice gentle paced 8 miler – got a bit puffy in the first place but first 2k were a bit quick. Kept the pace down to 6 mins+ per k, and mixed in a few faster bursts up hills then just coasted the last few miles with a few race pace strides in the last K. Bit slower than my last 8 miler but slightly different route anyway, but felt like a good aerobic workout and recovered nice and quickly.

5k Easy Run – death by humidity!

This was supposed to be an easy 5k I went off at an easy pace and by the end I was dying! It hadn’t felt warm when I went out, but pretty overcast, and seemed to be extremely humid which made an easy run feel a bit of a struggle. Legs felt heavy, think I’m still recovering from last week’s increased mileage – and will soon need to taper a bit for the Birchwood 10k in 2 weeks.

I checked the weather and humidity was at 95%. Explains it – my body is a useful humidity detector!!!