Week Commencing 2nd February
That's week 5 of London Marathon training complete. Now into the 50's for mileage which is when the serious training starts for me. 50+ is not a lot to some but when I'm not training for a marathon anything between 20-30 mile a week is pretty much the standard for me so doubling that already. Legs are feeling good and I'm feeling fitter in myself. I'm going to have to start looking after myself even more. Plenty of foam rolling, stretches, some core stuff and keep tweaking the nutrition. At the time of writing this I've not been in long from an 18 miler and feeling good all things considering. Was a very tough run out today that. Some very testing hills ran but I don't mind that at all. Flat tarmac runs does nothing for me in terms of training effect and their boring.
Onto the week. I started week 5 with the usual boring Monday night recovery run. Ran the usual 5 miler to Sadberge and back. This run is hard to get out for. Always run this on my own, its a Monday and I am always tired on this one. I just think to myself about why I am running this and the big picture. Running down that mall hammering out the final 400 metres or so. Tuesday I ran a decent interval session over the track which consisted of 13 x 400m intervals targeting around the mile/5k pace. So controlled reps and nothing full on. That went well despite the horrible windy and drizzly weather. I think it was actually sleety for a while then the temperature suddenly dropped towards the end as when I was running home the paths and untreated roads were lethal! Wednesday I got out with Brian for a 10 mile medium long run. Was good to get out with Brian. We had a good catch up and it made the run feel a lot shorter than it was. this is what you need for these longer mid week runs. Thursday I headed over the track once again. I had a 5 mile tempo effort planned. I knew a few were over the track so I headed over there. Got a couple of mile warm up in then cracked on with it. Runners will understand how hard these tempo runs can be. At mile 3 I was finding tough and even thought about shortening it to 4 mile but when I got to 4 I thought to myself "its only 1 more mile" and rattled it out. Felt good after doing that so joined a few of the harriers and ran a very fast 2 minute effort then cooled down with Keedy. I was off on Saturday morning so i headed down to the South Park and ran my 58th parkrun. After a sluggish warm up I was not overly fussed in "going for it"so set off at a reserved pace but after I seen my first mile flash 6:36 I didn't feel all that bad so pushed on and cranked up the pace a little. Was pleased to finished 13th out of over 200 runners in a time of 19:49. That was 10 seconds faster than 2 weeks ago so progress was being made. Its only 10 seconds I know but you add that up over the 10k, half marathon and marathon. Still quite a bit off where I need to be but I'll get there. Another reason to be pleased Saturday morning was my weekly weigh in I've lost 1 lb. Now putting me on a 7.5 total loss which puts me bang on par with my 1.5 weekly target. Onto today, a great 18 mile ran with Keedy, Michael King & Justin. Michael knows some great challenging routes around Piercebridge but its nice to get away from the streets of Darlington. Got introduced to "Gilling Bank" over near the A66. That was good to run down but brutal to run back up. After this was done I felt very strong into the 2nd half of the run so upped the pace a bit and finished strong. Through the training so far I'm running the long runs on NOTHING but a coffee when I get up. I'll go more into my reasoning for this another time but on the whole its to help my body become more fat adapted and teach my body to cope with runs when I am in a glycogen depleted state. One thing I am making sure I do though is eat LOTS after the run to replenish and recovery. A mixed carb/protein shake soon as I am finished then a big bowl of porridge with a whey protein shake soon as I get in. I need to work on getting more fluids into me though. I'm sat here right now drinking a coffee!
Monday - 5 mile recovery @ 8:12 pace
Onto the week. I started week 5 with the usual boring Monday night recovery run. Ran the usual 5 miler to Sadberge and back. This run is hard to get out for. Always run this on my own, its a Monday and I am always tired on this one. I just think to myself about why I am running this and the big picture. Running down that mall hammering out the final 400 metres or so. Tuesday I ran a decent interval session over the track which consisted of 13 x 400m intervals targeting around the mile/5k pace. So controlled reps and nothing full on. That went well despite the horrible windy and drizzly weather. I think it was actually sleety for a while then the temperature suddenly dropped towards the end as when I was running home the paths and untreated roads were lethal! Wednesday I got out with Brian for a 10 mile medium long run. Was good to get out with Brian. We had a good catch up and it made the run feel a lot shorter than it was. this is what you need for these longer mid week runs. Thursday I headed over the track once again. I had a 5 mile tempo effort planned. I knew a few were over the track so I headed over there. Got a couple of mile warm up in then cracked on with it. Runners will understand how hard these tempo runs can be. At mile 3 I was finding tough and even thought about shortening it to 4 mile but when I got to 4 I thought to myself "its only 1 more mile" and rattled it out. Felt good after doing that so joined a few of the harriers and ran a very fast 2 minute effort then cooled down with Keedy. I was off on Saturday morning so i headed down to the South Park and ran my 58th parkrun. After a sluggish warm up I was not overly fussed in "going for it"so set off at a reserved pace but after I seen my first mile flash 6:36 I didn't feel all that bad so pushed on and cranked up the pace a little. Was pleased to finished 13th out of over 200 runners in a time of 19:49. That was 10 seconds faster than 2 weeks ago so progress was being made. Its only 10 seconds I know but you add that up over the 10k, half marathon and marathon. Still quite a bit off where I need to be but I'll get there. Another reason to be pleased Saturday morning was my weekly weigh in I've lost 1 lb. Now putting me on a 7.5 total loss which puts me bang on par with my 1.5 weekly target. Onto today, a great 18 mile ran with Keedy, Michael King & Justin. Michael knows some great challenging routes around Piercebridge but its nice to get away from the streets of Darlington. Got introduced to "Gilling Bank" over near the A66. That was good to run down but brutal to run back up. After this was done I felt very strong into the 2nd half of the run so upped the pace a bit and finished strong. Through the training so far I'm running the long runs on NOTHING but a coffee when I get up. I'll go more into my reasoning for this another time but on the whole its to help my body become more fat adapted and teach my body to cope with runs when I am in a glycogen depleted state. One thing I am making sure I do though is eat LOTS after the run to replenish and recovery. A mixed carb/protein shake soon as I am finished then a big bowl of porridge with a whey protein shake soon as I get in. I need to work on getting more fluids into me though. I'm sat here right now drinking a coffee!
Monday - 5 mile recovery @ 8:12 pace
Tuesday - Speed - 13 x 400m intervals on track targeting around mile/5k pace. 7.3 mile covered
Wednesday - 10 mile medium long run @ 8:03 pace
Thursday - 5 mile tempo run @ 6:25 pace + 1 x 2 minute effort @ 5:16 pace. 7.9 mile covered
Friday - Rest
Saturday - Darlington South Park parkrun - 19:49 @ 6:24 pace. 5 mile covered inc warm up and cool downs
Sunday - 18 mile long run @ 7:50 pace
This weeks weigh in : 177 Lbs (Starting weight 184.5 Lbs/Target weight 160 Lbs)
Lost so far since 3rd January: 7.5 lbs
Lost so far since 3rd January: 7.5 lbs
Weekly mileage - 53.4
 |
| Paul Cook, Me & "Boy Wonder" Dean Newton @ yesterday's parkrun |
 |
| Darlington South Park parkrun - 19:49 |
Week conclusion and looking ahead.
Next week see's me expecting to run around 58 miles and the release of Fifty Shades of Gray!. Another hard week planned. I have swapped the next 2 weeks of my schedule around as I'm running the Blackpool Half Marathon 2 weeks today. I'm scheduled to run a half marathon next Sunday but running the week afters 20 mile instead if that makes any sense?!?
No comments:
Post a Comment