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Moraghan Training - Stevie G
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Come on SG, it's the first sentence.
ahem....the above obviously will be the press commentary..not 3rd person jobbies.......just before AG (in a particularly angry couple of days I feel, combusts totally
)
AG has been very busy at work, he is enjoying venting
Fair enough AG! Been off work early his week so tend to post a bit less, missed some great stuff. unsuprisingly I'm in agreement regarding the loads of marathons thing, but as long as they enjoy it, each to their own I suppose. I'm a bit cynical attimes when I shouldn't be- I just couldnt warm to that Lloyd bloke who did the diving suit London marathon, despite raising loads of dosh for brilliant causes I just thought he was an attention seeker!
Dachs-yeah the football analogy,guilty as charged I'm afraid. Can't help it, in the blood..i would be a lot richer if it wasnt. Reps look decent too, coming back a bit now.
Tues night was ok, 8 x 1k but split into 4 sets of 2, with one steady, one fast. Idea to have the faster 15-20 secs faster than the steady. They came out as 3.23/3.03, 3.18/3.00, 3.17/2.58, 3.15/2.55. Recoveries were 30 secs between reps and 1.20 ish between sets. Great night for running and even vest weather,
DId 9 on weds, felt OK. Spoilt it by getting a bit pissed Weds night and had an annoying headache most of yesterday. I think I'm going for no hangover till xmas now. I managed a summer of no hangovers before Berlin, so it's time to ease off again.
Might do a steady 5 today and then Mansfield tomorrow. As I have done a few times in the past, I'm the only runner, least I get first leg!
Stop it!
Simon - Interesting session. 2:55 at the end of all that is proper tasty.
My post-Berlin legs are coming back sloowly. Could do with a few quick sessions over the next week or so, since I'm running for England in two weeks. Oo-eck.
Really like the steady/hard session as although it's quite hard, it's not very high up the list of really knackering sessions. If you can get the fast ones out and you're not sloughing too much on the steady it's really beneficial. Probably one of my best sessions I've done there, only a few secs sly of one of the good Luton lads. Hopefully my Mansfield time trial will be decent.
even those steady kms look tasty to me Simon!
In more humble affairs, I carried on my "tour" of the more mentally comfortable sessions. Have enjoyed 400,200,800s in that order, so through some 600s in.
7, vaguely 5k the aim, 90secs the recovery.
Whereas the 800s last week were in still conditions, this was more classic track fare, with a distinct part of the lap into blustery wind and plenty of rain. Meaning one of those weird ones where it's a tidy 200m start, then for 200m you're digging in, and then for 200m thinking you're flying.
Therefore, around the same pace as the 800s, but more volume in total.
almost symmetrical, needed number 3 and 6 to sync up better!
1.57,1.58,1.58,2.00,1.59,1.58,1.57
Nice session, nice drive back to work, less nice stressy parking shenanighans due to our work's highly complex space allocation matrix, meaning I had to temporarily use one space, edged out a little clumsily probably due to unfamiliarity with the space and being post session, and very gently tickled the bumper of a chap's car. Minimal tiny scuff, and he's not too fussed, so...phew!
ps good luck Phil. Presumably, the England Geezer squad?
Good consistency there SG.
Yeah, the England teams have got categories going from Geezer all the way up to Diamond Geezer (and Grand Dames??), for the forthcoming British & Irish International Cross Country in Dublin, 14th November. Still haven't received my vest to see if the red hue goes with my shorts.
Phil, you will get your vest on the morning of the race from the England hq. Which is more glamorous than it sounds as it's normally a changing room.
Solid reps SC. Sub 3min kms
600s are always interesting SG.
PP I'm sure the vest will have been spun from gossamer by virgin spiders. Interesting that there are M35s on the roster. Are they half-geezers? I'm sure you'll smash it up.
I spent half term doing some DIY including wallpapering a feature wall in our lounge. I'm off to the US on Sunday, perhaps passing PMJ in mid air? Flying home Thursday PM, arriving Friday morning then racing Ballbuster duathlon on Saturday morning.
Then I can have a few weeks off, relax and recover. Sod XC for a few weeks, this season has dragged on enough already.
Looking forward to seeing how Phil shapes up against Terry from 'Terry and June's, though I'd have thought he'd be older than a M40.
Superb repping Simon, all getting faster!
Brilliant, just went to post a very long one and Firefox crashed! Hey ho, nub was-must be a buzz to have that to look forward to PP. Sure the red smhorts will complement thevest!
Simon, cracking sesssion that!
Lovely run tonight for me, 7.5M and 2000+feet of climbing to top of my week in the Lakes. Total of 12000 feet and 40M of running, plus another 8000ft and 25M of walking, despite the weather. Tonight's run was very lucky- the rain cleared just in time for a fantastic sun-lit dusk and amazing views from Wansfell Pike of a beautiful red sunset over valleys filling with mist. Very atmospheric, though on the finalascent I was pretty nervous about getting stuck out in the dark with a tricky descent to finish! Hey ho, back darn sarf tomorrow...
Good reps all.
Simon, maybe you should join my club. They are all off to Mansfield tomorrow and are one runner short of a full second team.
Needless to say, if my (much improved knee) had been up to it, I'd be going.
Could be interesting, the club has our 'star' runner Adam Bowden back from tri-athlon for a rare outing. He used to do ok in the Chiltern League's.
As for the old knee. On Wednesday it was 'holding one's breath' level. While today it had again improved to the stage I might consider doing something audacious, like run again.
🙂
Simon. This year I won't be doing the SM XC.
It's the usual case of on alternate years of me being off to New Zealand. (One year I was taking off as the race was under way).
Other years I've been out of shape, so I've only run one of these to my knowledge.
Chris is a team mate of mine, and the year I ran the event I finished 2nd counter from the team of three V50's. Chris was second, I was somewhere.
Bearing in mind that in the entire history of the event, the highest position any team from Harrow AC had managed was fifth, none of us were expecting anything as regards results.
Some time after finishing, our third placer Mike Barron came up to me and said he thinks there might be a chance we had sneaked a medal. A medal!, any medal will do.
So off we trotted to check the results. A bronze would do nicely. However, my lad beat us to it.
"You've won".
What!!!
"You've won. By one point".
W T !!!!
Where's Chris?
So raced off to find Chris, who we found in some assembly room.
Chris!!! (He looks around).
We've won!!!
Utter disbelief.
Cue the dogs with two tails time.
So team gold and individual silver for Chris. Result.
🙂
Race report,
October 30th 2015: Last Friday of the Month 5k, Hyde Park.
Set off from home in torrential rain, so much so that by the time I got on the train at Stockport I was soaked, taking my shoes and socks off on the train to try to get them dry!
Arrived in London early due to the cheap tickets; by now it had just about stopped raining so strolled and went for a pot of tea before a further stroll through Green Park and on to Buck House, catching part of the Changing of the Guard. Walked on into Hyde Park and picked up my number, initially being disappointed to be put in the “B” race, although on reflection this may not have been too bad a thing. Change in the loos, say hello to a few friends and then a couple of ks to warm up. By now the weather is nigh on perfect: grey, 13 or 14 degrees and a gentle breeze.
The “A” race is off, so we in the “B” have two minutes to wait. And we are off! Try not to go out too hard and settle into about 15th place. Deliberately don’t look at my watch until 500 metres or so after a short climb: 4:07 is the current pace which is marginally too fast, I feel, so back off a little, yet pass people already who have gone off too quickly. First k comes up in 4:11. Is this too fast, I wonder? Having not raced since mid August when I clocked 20:50 on an ultra-fast course doubts start to emerge. Hang on in there and keep this pace. The second k starts uphill, and then down, then flat: the 2k mark arrives in 4:10. Shortly afterwards I need a good talk with myself as the pace drops to 4:15. Lift it, I tell myself, and on cue a guy in blue comes by. I glue my eyes to his back, reminding myself that this is what you would do on the track. 3k split comes up in 4:11, so the talking to worked. Along the far side of the Serpentine and Mr. Blue still has a shadow. Up a short sharp hill and manage to hang on to my pacer and we pick it up, certainly effort-wise. The 4th k ticks over in 4:12.
4 minutes or so to run, I tell myself, and try, and fail, to do some mental maths to see what time I can expect. Four years ago I ran 21:21, so 21:20 would be nice; in May I ran 22:11 so this was going to be a definite improvement...and I had been reasonably pleased with that time!
A short climb brings 250 to go...and unusually my legs can’t pick it up in the finishing straight; Mr Blue does though and I come in a few seconds adrift, clocking 20:55 on my watch, and indeed, on the official results. 77.67% WAVA, and about 5th in the “B”, I am told. More to come when I'm older.
Rehydrated in the quirky Nag's Head in Belgravia with a couple of pints at twice the price of my local, nipped and got changed before cocktails. Ate at Ham Yard Hotel's restaurant in Soho: PP, certainly up there in my London restaurant experiences! Then was forced into a couple more alehouses to prepare myself for Saturday's parkrun which was completed at a more leisurely sub 25.
Sounds like a cracking day too. Do you have a place down there or just visiting? Love going round the pubs in the big smoke.
With the Full Tour of Pendle in a couple of weeks, I thought I'd better have a run round some of the course. Still undecided on if I'm going to do it or maybe do Leeds Abbeydash or a 10k at the end of the month. Pretty much all my running has been on the canal for 3 months so 15 miles on the fells with 3500ft of ascent was hard work.
Hard to explain what it's like for those who've not been on the fells but today was like running 15 miles through a swamp up some hills that aren't runnable. 2 hours 30 mins caked in shit for 15 miles. Happy days.
nice one Aley. Is that the "B course" then? The little ups sound familiar, but perhaps I'm wrong as you didn't necessarily mention 2 laps? Do both courses have those little inclines? How do the even decide which route to do, obviously the one I met you at was the B course as there was some massive event on.
Matt, sounds gruesome. Long duration of running that one!
Went to sleep at a madly rock n roll..erm...8.30 yesterday, with a hot head. Probably my own fault for lounging around post 6miler. Didn't overly fancy the long run, come wakeup, but came out comfortably enough, usual sub 7.
Stayed away from the Marlow half course in the end. Some years I have the idea of running the course before, but normally when it comes down to it, I don't want to go anywhere near the hullabaloo of a race I could have been doing.
So, state of play
62.5mile week, amended tempo session, and good 600s.
If I can put a couple of weeks of tempos in feeling good, I'd be in a decent place to throw some race in. But still have the nag. 10th Nov is hopefully the last appointment, and will say there's nothing nasty going on...probably just some low level viral thing that is hard to go completely as I keep 60mile weeking it!
Pretty good pace for that route Matt! Bit of last minute hill training on top of your marathon legs will sort you out for FToP
Nice running trip Alehouse
good WAVA
Finger's crossed for the knee Ric.
11M off-road in the sunshine today. So warm I had to do an SG and go topless! Legs were shot though and this was a hilly one too far I think after this week's exploits!
SG: the course we did in May was the "alternative" course, because of the World Tri Champs or something! The usual course is one lap (suspect it will be on the Serpentine website). November and December's races will also be on the alternative course due to Winter Wonderland! Even the main course has a number of undulations, the last of which found my legs wanting a little. I am looking into trains for December's edition!
Matt: usually stay with friends although on this occasion I got a room through airbnb. Not a cheap 34 hours but enjoyed every minute of it. Except when it was my round, that is. When I was younger spent a fair amount of time on the fells: it never got easy although it did help with strength for the track and road.
After over 50 years of running I am still learning: in the last few years the runners I coach sit down and write "what went well", and "even better if" (WWW/EBI) and then compare notes. So...
W: I am running, with a course PB, even after prostate cancer and an Achilles op since the previous course PB;
W: splits were even and concentration was good;
W: in the couple of weeks leading up to the race I had had a chest infection and hurt both my back and shoulder. The latter two didn’t affect my running, and at no stage was my breathing laboured even though the peak flow is still 100 below what it should be. The issue was that my little legs just wouldn’t go any faster!
E: do I risk staying at the 4:07 pace?
B: need to work on core strength, particularly stomach, which was the only sore part the next day;
I: half a stone lighter would make things easier!
Wondering what my training is going to look like now? Do I continue as I am, which is largely steady off-road running, probably upping the volume a little, and learning from Bus and Matt in particular, throwing in more hills, or do I introduce speed work, and risk injury? The latter is certainly what disappears as we get older, rather than stamina, but as we get older it leaves us very vulnerable to tweaks and pulls. Nothing is ever straightforward!
Results through and only 80th out of about 550 and only 8th v50. Shows the standard (winner 49.xx) as usually higher than that in v50 terms even in big races like Fleet and Wokingham!
Looks like people were making the most of the lovely weather. Nice runs all.
Matt looks like now the Marathon is done you can just go out and have fun for a bit. I wish I had fells to run where I live.
A fair bit of running for me this week 57.7 miles although that includes an 18 miler that was really supposed to be in the week before. Still it's a new high for 7 days.
Finished with a 13.1m along the seafront @ 7:08, early days re extra miles but starting to feel a bit quicker.
Brodie Castle 10k Race Report:
Pre-race couple of days wasn't ideal - I hurt my knee a bit on Thursday night messing about with Ella and a bean bag... It wasn't good on Friday but the heat pack helped and the run on Saturday was fine thankfully!!
Sunday morning routine was always going to be a bit difficult as we aren't at home this week but managed to stick to the banana, porridge and tea combo and with an 11am start, it was easy to eat 4 hours in advance. Nice looking morning, drive to Fraserburgh and jump on the team bus!
We've got about an hour to spare when we arrive so plenty of time for picking up number etc before a gradual warm up. Trying to shake out the nerves but to be fair I wasn't feeling that nervous. Bit of a break then another 5 mins with a few strides just a few mins before the start.
And we're off - uphill right at the start, couple of tight turns then we're downhill and I'm going too quick. Try to slow it down a bit but go with it as I'm in a group with a couple of clubmates (who I expect to be slower than me so figure it's maybe not that quick with the downhill).
I find myself at the front of the chasing group with about 10 ahead of me with a decent gap. At the back of that group is my clubmate who I beat at Parkrun last week and I contemplate chasing him down early because I expect the guys roundabout to drop off and I'll then be isolated. I weigh up the current pace of 3:36/km, the fact it doesn't feel windy but decide I'm going quick enough and chasing down probably not the best idea. In hindsight, knowing how the second half went, I think I should have chased him down and tried to hang onto him the rest of the way. Live and learn though!!
Through the first couple of km in 3:36.7 and 3:35.9. I knew that was quicker than target but it was downhill and it felt very comfortable. The next couple of km it felt a bit more uphill and I'd settled into 3:41/3:42 pace but everyone roundabout had dropped off and I was running solo now - I could still see my clubmate up ahead and he wasn't getting any farther away.
Turned the corner and faced with a very long straight and it was downhill now but the wind was brutal!! As I turned I saw another clubmate was directly behind me but he fell away very soon after the turn. My clubmate ahead had gone past a guy with a dark vest so my focus shifted to him. He was definitely getting closer. The pace was really slow on the watch and it felt so much harder with the wind and didn't feel like I was slowing down!! At one point it crept above 4:00/km which I decided wasn't acceptable...! Km 5 was 3:56.7 and through 5k in 18:33 which gives me a chance of sub 37 if I manage to get it together...
I ease past the guy with the dark vest despite the pace staying in the 3:50s and I see the average dropping down to 3:47 (adjusted target was 3:45 for 37:30 but that was slipping away!). I'm now behind my clubmate and I entertain thoughts again of pushing it to try and catch him but mentally, I can't face it in the wind and keep thinking I'll wait until we're out of the wind and then I'll give it a go.
We eventually turn out of the wind with less than 2k to go but I can't seem to muster much of an assault on the pace and he disappears for the first time as there are a few turns round the woods etc. Then all of a sudden it's the home straight and I realise the worry I had about not going sub 38 isn't going to materialise. My clubmate puts in a strong finish so no hope of catching him - I also finish fairly strong and clock 37:41.
/cont.
Huge PB obviously but I could have ran this better. I should have probably held back a bit at the start but I think that back stretch of about 3-4K would still have been a nightmare so maybe the quick start downhill wasn't really the problem. Equally, having started quick I think I made the mistake of not chasing the leading pack and hanging onto the back of it because the guys at the back never got further away from me. A difficult one because at the time, I was running in a group and I did expect them to drop away but they all fell off at about the same time and I did expect the leaders to come back to me a bit more as well but only the guy in 10th did and I cruised past him.
Perspective - 37:41 is a bloody good time compared to where I was last year. That's a time I would have thought was absolutely amazing last summer, so got to be pleased with it. And the fact I know I can take a chunk off it shows the progress being made. I'm excited about 2016!!
CC82 never knock a PB especially if ou coem away thinking you can knock more off it in the future.
Monthly stats in late due to flying back from the US. Hope Iron got into the air yesterday, luckily the fog did not stop us landing and got a very unusual view of the sky scrapers in Docklands sticking out above the fog.
October 204.91 miles at an average pace of 7:41 and just shy of 1,800 for the year so will top 2,000 easily.
Got a 5k race in while out in the US, Halloween 5k. 19:34 was the slightly disappointing outcome: I'd have liked to be much closer to 19 minutes (and indeed under) but I guess the effects of jet lag and far too much champagne the night before added up. Splits were encouraging with miles of 6:11, 6:12 and 6:21 so not too much of a slow down. Also beat the macho yank with "Pain is just weakness leaving the body" top on.
Great race reports everyone, all seem to be going well too, Well done all! PMJ has a decent excuse for being slightly off the pace! Been doing the odd LFOTM over the last 10-15 years - it was easier when I worked in South Ken as it was a nice jog up from work. Loads bigger these days though and the proper course is pretty quick, great last K once you are up past the boathouse and down Rotten Row.
Ric - Nice story, shame you're not around in December. I presume you know Alan Wray too?
Mansfield was ok - ground a little softer than last year, did 16.44 for the 5k course, did 16.30 last year. The top boys all seemed to be 15 secs or so down on last year, so I'll have that. Very tired when I finished - it's the hills that seem to bring out my slightly tired quads!
13 miles yesterday, quite hilly in 1.32 so about 7mm.
Great report CC, and plenty more to come. A lot of improvement comes simply from racing more often.
Good excuse, PMJ! Still a decent time! And you too, Pete.
SC: when I was younger, or rather a lot younger, I would have found that Hyde Park course pretty fast. Now, though the little inclines like the one before Rotten Row and the one up to the finishing straight seem to drain the legs. And not too shabby at Mansfield!
Yes Simon, I know Alan Wray. He's had some quite spectacular results in the XC.
Mind you I remember one Chiltern League where I came up on him while he was stationary with some sort of injury. I reckoned he wasn't going to finish that one so commiserated (briefly) and carried on.
Clearly he decided to 'man up' after that, and; after he'd caught me (in return), I had to endure the sight of him pulling away on what appeared to be one leg.
Running performance (speed) once again was proved relative. For most of us on the thread our recovery speed is faster than the average runners 'parkrun' speed.
Then again, I once read of an Olympic 800m (Peter Elliott!!!!) runner that his easy jogging pace was 5:15 miling.
🙂