Weekly Summary – 16/06/2013 including Littledown Marathon and Puddletown Plod 20k

Mon – 6 miles (6:59m/m)
Tue – 12.5 miles including 10 miles @ 5:32m/m
Wed – AM 6 mile jog PM 12 miles (7:00m/m)
Thu – AM 6 mile jog PM 12 miles (6:32m/m)
Fri – 6 miles (6:23m/m)
Sat – Littledown Marathon (1st – 2:36:01)
Sun – 22.48 miles including Puddletown Plod 20k (5th – 72min)

Total mileage – 109.54 miles (6:24m/m)

So normally when I add “including Littledown Marathon” on my blog title it means I have been running around the Littedown 1 mile grass loop on my own for “fun” but this time I actually entered an official race which was set up for the first time last year and invites others to offically get dizzy as well ;-)
Just to prove there was a real race, here’s the finish line set-up

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and the website …….. Littledown Marathon

Anyway, more on the race in a bit. The plan for this week was to have a break from building the REALLY Long run over the Purbecks and do a bit of faster than 100k speed work over the weekend. Still wanted to get in a couple of decent sized long runs along with the increased pace so the opportunity to do both the marathon on the Saturday and incorporating the 20k race into today’s long run seemed like a good plan.

Because of the extra intensity at the weekend I just did a single 10 mile marathon pace effort on Tuesday for the weeks “speed” and was pleased to see that come in with a 5:32m/m average, a nice progression on last weeks efforts.

Have to say I felt a little bit “jaded” the rest of the week and wasn’t sure how well the weekend plans were going to go but by Saturday morning I was feeling a lot better and up for putting some effort in.
I was actually thinking that something around 6:15m/m pace would do for the marathon but as always when I get on that grass loop I get into a good rhythm and end up running faster than planned! It was great having 70 other people on the same loop and everyone was very friendly cheering each other on, much more fun than just me and Jacek which is the normal setup.
It got a little tough towards the end with tired legs but pleased that sub 6m/m pace felt comfortable and ended up with 2:36:01 for the win and the added bonus of £100 for the course record :-) Great little race and well organised by the “Run yer Socks Off” team.

They even did a full set of mile splits with the chip timing….. I was quite pleased with my consistent splits and last lap being the fastest :-)

Littledown Marathon Results 2013

So because I had ended up running the marathon a little faster than planned I wasn’t quite sure how todays run was going to go. The plan was 10 miles easy and then the 20k race at around the same pace as yesterday on an undulating loop.
Legs just about coped and managed around 5:45 pace for the 20k and a valuable 5th place in my BAC vest as this is a Dorset League race this year. Another really well organised race and a great atmosphere – full details of the race here

Having done quite a few miles this week at faster than race pace, the plan next week is to get back to building the “time on feet” aspect of my long run so look out for another biggy next weekend!

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Weekly Summary – 09/06/13

Mon – 10.12 miles (7:28m/m)
Tue – 12.72 miles including 10 miles @ 5:45m/m
Wed – 12.12 miles (6:44m/m)
Thu – 12.71 miles including 10 miles @ 5:37m/m
Fri – 6.23 miles (6:56m/m)
Sat – 26.23 miles (6:43m/m)
Sun – 35.00 miles over the Purbecks (7:20m/m)

Total mileage – 115.14 miles (6:48m/m)

So with the man flu gone and the socialising at a minimum this week I managed to put together a much more appropriate week of training which pretty much ended up exactly how I wanted it.
The mid week runs on Tuesday and Thursday with 10 miles at “just under marathon effort” went to plan. I could feel the back to back long runs from the previous weekend in my legs on Tuesday night which kept the pace in check a little but by Thursday I felt a lot more comfortable and it was good to see the place starting to come down for the same effort levels.
In general I have started to feel my aerobic strength building and so I felt a little more comfortable upping the pace for this weekends “back to back” effort.
The original plan was to do 3hrs Saturday but when I realised that the pace I felt comfortable at was going to roughly get me the marathon distance I stuck to that. Sped up a little at the end of the run thanks to training partner Jacek joining me for the last 10 miles so ended up with a 2:56 marathon.
The plan for Sunday was to do our standard 17.5 mile Purbeck loop….. twice ;-)
Really appreciated the fact I had company on both laps with friends Graeme and Nige joining me on lap 1 and and then trusty training partner “Jay-C” meeting up with me again for the start of my second lap and then deliberately pacing me to 100km target pace for the last 5km. So 35 miles @ 7:20m/m with a slightly faster second half and feeling strong (but very tired!) operating at 100km race pace at the end. A pleasing finish to the weekends back to back efforts.

Time to vegetate for the rest of the day……. apart from the fact Mrs Way has just informed me we are off to do the “food shop” – marvellous!

Enjoy the sun all :-)

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Weekly Summary x2 – 02/06/13

Week Ending 26th May
Mon – 10 miles (6:43m/m)
Tue –  12.69 miles including 10 miles @5:40m/m
Wed – 21.41 miles (6:46m/m)
Thu – REST
Fri – 12.7 miles  including 9 miles @5:40m/m
Sat – 25.1 miles (7:11m/m)
Sun – REST

Total mileage – 81.89 miles (6:37m/m)

Week Ending 2nd June
Mon – 9 miles (7:19m/m)
Tue – Man Flu
Wed – Man Flu
Thu – 10 miles (6:10m/m)
Fri – 12 miles (6:59m/m)
Sat – 21 miles (7:12m/m)
Sun – 31.5 miles over the Purbecks (7:37m/m)

Total mileage – 83.53 miles (7:11m/m)

So I promise to start blogging again and then I miss my first weekly summary….. SLACKER!

Unfortunately these first 2 weeks 100KM training didn’t really go quite to plan.

In the first week, everything was going okay  with a couple of 10 mile “tempo” runs on Tuesday and Friday just under marathon effort. These type of “high aerobic” effort runs tend to bring my general fitness on nicely so the plan at least for the next few weeks was to try and get a couple of these in the bag mid-week and hopefully see the speed gradually increase for them.

I knew I was going to struggle to get consistent training in over the Bank Holiday weekend as we were entertaining guests. I managed to get my long run in Saturday morning before everyone was up but then the rest of Saturday/Sunday  was a bit of a write off with large amounts of drinking and BBQ eating :-)

By the time Monday came around I was feeling guilty and well up for another decent long run but it was at this point I realised I was coming down with a bad dose of “Man Flu” and struggled round a 9 mile run feeling like death.

2 days off work and running and I was feeling good enough to return to both by Thursday. I decided to go out with my HR monitor on to see if my body was fully recovered or not, planning on sticking to the same “high aerobic” effort from the previous weeks tempo runs. It wasn’t long before I realised that I was obviously still carrying the cold virus as my HR shot up and I had to back off the pace to ensure i didn’t do any further damage.

Have felt much better in myself over this weekend but decided to keep the pace very relaxed for my Friday/Saturday/Sunday runs until the HR comes back down to normal levels.

I did however manage 2 good “time on feet” runs yesterday and today with 2hr 30min on Saturday and 4hrs over the Purbecks this morning.

I wasn’t sure how far I was going to travel in 4hrs so in the end I decided to just run for 2hrs and then turn around and come back! Worked well apart from the fact that it meant I had to tackle the Purbeck hills twice, 2nd time on very tired legs. Clocked up 31.5 miles which is actually the furthest I’ve ever run in one go (just!) but only just over half my race distance in 9 weeks …….. GULP

Hopefully should be back in full training next week if the virus is completely out of my system.

 

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