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The Middle Ground
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Darola - nice report, interesting you make the point about knowing how much it can hurt - definitely worth the odd second per mile I think.
Considering what hell I put myself through on Thursday evening, recovery was absolutely fine. Did a very comfortable feeling 10.5 miles yesterday, and this morning had another first, an interval session before breakfast. Alarm didn't go off so woke up at 8.55, due to meet club mates at the track - 20 mins jog from home - at 9.30, so just enough time for a coffee and loo break, then down to the track for 10 x 300 off short recovery - 100 walk/jog averaging about 50s. All reps were 51/52 with a 50 to finish, which I was pleased with considering I was barely awake. A nice sharpener before Wednesday's 1500 smack-down.
PRF.. nice rant there, though you have overlooked one thing. You won't be able to understand a word of the Geordie dialect up there, you might as well be in Bulgaria! However as a geordie exile, for a small fee, I could offer my services as an interpretor..
BTW I thought you were a bit harsh on that drunk, he probably just wanted your autograph!
PP.. come on, show the boys & girls your American diner photo, that's a cracker that one! Splendid effort on the track BTW.
Nice racing Darola, I'm on a comeback curve of sorts myself, will be good to compare progress. 42:53 for me on a waterlogged but very flat 10k course on Tuesday, 37 secs better than a comparative course a month ago so I will take that for now.
Duck: lap 24...time to concentrate and do a lot of thinking! I have a friend called Xavier, though, and my son had a girl friend called Xanthe!
Good progress Wardi: thank you for doing things on behalf of us oldies! By the way Sam Smith's has gone up to £1.65. Outrageous!
Darola - Good effort and nice to see you digging deep as well (both in the race and the report!). Enjoy the tumbling times.
Wardi - Sounds like consistent progress there. Hopefully not too long before you are back to your best.
Phil - That 10,000 sounds like it was a pretty hot race quality wise. Well toughed out.
Duck - I think a tash like that would suit me. Maybe I'll give it a try
The first Chester-le-Street parkrun this morning for me along with PRF, BR and Hilly. Decent little course. Pretty flat with few tight turns and a section on grass each lap. A small PB to finish in 17.42. Consensus seemed to be something in the region of Hull plus 15 secs (not that I've ever run Hull but it seems to be the benchmark!).
I cant believe I had that rant, anyone would think I was ungrateful!
Darola - I know what you mean about the pain switching off, the trouble is that it doesnt last very long. Sounds like you're really toughening yourself up mentally!.
Treadmill - Looking forward to seeing you top that age graded league again over the next few months.
Phil - It might be the best time to do interval sessions, before your body has realised what you're up to! I did a few mile rep sessions at 7am last year and they were just as good, if not better, than at other times of day.
Wardi - Dont worry, I'm putting plenty training in on that front, Middlesbrough last week, Chester-Le-Street today. Tbh as long as they understand the words 'black coffee' the rest is an irrelevance.
As the speedy Mr V has already mentioned, it was the inaugural Chester-Le-Street parkrun this morning. It actually turned out to be the fastest inaugural parkrun in history with a 14:43 winning time.
Meanwhile, the more sedate of us did what we could to post respectable times. My legs were much happier than I expected today considering that it was uncomfortable to even walk yesterday - splits of 5:40, 5:50, 6:00 resulted in an 18:04 clocking as the legs whinged in the second half.
But Mr V looked very comfortable as he ran his fastest ever 5K - much more to come judging by that effort.
Nice racing Darola and Wardi!
Good work from Mr V today to snatch a pb and signs of more to come off seeing as it's not as fast as some courses we mentioned
A come back parkfun for me today that had me running the whole way just behind a 14 year old girl that beat me by 3 seconds. I did sprint to try and take her near the line, but left it too late and her bambi legs were much springier than mine! Anyhow, a decent if not a fast time for me with 20:14, quicker than I've run since the virus so can't complain at that. Signs are that I will get back to normal fitness quite quickly. I felt like I was trying the legs out today almost a bit unsure how hard to push, so definitely feel able to push harder next time, that'll be next weekend then
Great parkruns guys. Mr V a great pb and you're making a prf/YD/you smackdown very interesting indeed. Hilly, nice you seem to be moving in the right direction now. And not bad for a right grind/slog prf!
Pretty quick for not long out of bed Phil! And off of 50s rec it must have been reasonably tough.
Weather for me tomorrow looks like I will have a headwind down the main straight which will be useful to have while hanging on for dear life. Won't be able to report until Monday as I'm staying in Edinburgh tomorrow night. Knee lift, relax, drive.... hopefully pb!
Good report, Darola. Glad to see you picked it up at the end.
Nice parkrunning people, and congrats on the PB, Mr V.
Phil, if that is 1500 pace I may not bother turning up on Wednesday
Hilly, nice to see you back out. Yes, I am sure the fitness will return before you know it.
I did an 800, a 1500 and the second leg of the 4 x 400 at SAL today.
I felt pretty good before the 800 and a clubmate and I had decided to go for a PB (mine 2:12.8; his 2:12.2) and start with a 64/65 first lap. There were 10 in the race, which meant lanes 7 and 8 had to share. I was on the inside of lane 8.
I ran relaxed around the first 100 to the break point and cut across into 7th place, ahead of the clubmate. The pace felt slow and I desperately wanted to go around the guy in front, but the field was not very strung out, and had I tried to overtake I would have nowhere to cut back in, so not wanting to risk running a bend in lane two, I just stayed where I was.
I went through the bell in 66 seconds. I figured a PB was off the cards now, but stayed strong around the bend and really worked hard not to lose pace down the back straight. The guy ahead of me kicked and I tried to stay with him, but couldn't quite manage it as he went flying past the runner in front of him
Going into the home straight I felt my clubmate on my shoulder and knew he would go past (he always outkicks me), and he did. But I was catching the other runner ahead and got past him with about 50 to go. It was a good race for the line, between the three of us and although I didn't end up beating my clubmate, I went through the line in 2:11.4 to take 1.2 seconds off my PB.
I had three hours between the 800 and the 1500, which I felt was a good enough break to run a decent one, but after the first lap I realised I was just shattered from the 800 and although I ran strongish I had to overtake twice on the bends, and could just not get stuck into it and finished in 4:39. Not worried about that. I'll save the decent 1500 for Wednesday
The 4 x 400 was fun. I was the slowest of our four and was on the second leg. I took the baton in first place and basically had to run flat out for 200 to try and hold off the proper sprinter coming up behind me. The idea was not to beat him - which was not going to happen - but to at least force him to run wide on the first bend so that he would not finish his leg quite as quickly. He did have to run wide, but I needn't have worried since legs 3 and 4 won it easily for Croydon. We also won the day, which is always nice. my split was 59.4. The other guys ran theirs in 54/55
MIDDLE GROUND WAVA LEAGUE (April- July)
Calculator here: http://www.howardgrubb.co.uk/athletics/wmalookup06.html
84.68% Hilly (5K, 19:20, April)
83.98% PhilPub (HM, 1:12:48, May)
83.19% BR (10K, 34:40, June)
81.22% PRF (10K, 36:37, June)
77.97% forever (10K, 42:34, April)
77.46% Duck (800m, 2'10.58, May)
77.17% Simon E (800m, 2'11.40 July)
74.50% YD (5K, 17:31, April)
73.94% Minni (10K, 42:57, April)
72.73% Ratzer (100m, 14.2, June)
72.68% Mr V (5K, 17:45, June)
71.95% Dash (10K, 39:47, April)
70.10% YoungPup (5K, 19:29, June)
68.63% Dr.Dan (5K, 20:40, June)
67.40% Darola (5K, 21:12, June)
64.94% CB (5K, 20:25, April)
Nice day of racing there Simon and excellent new 800m pb! What do you expect to run for 1500 when going for it?
Off to take in a race today as part of our long run, but definitely not racing it.
Simon - Congratulations on the new PB. I find it interesting that 1-2 secs on the first lap was enough to make you think that the pb attempt was gone. Maybe negative splitting an 800 is a reasonable strategy despite perceived wisdom suggesting otherwise?
On the basis that Race Directors can be on the receiving end of quite a bit of moaning, I would just like to point out an excellent response that I got to an email about the anomaly with the finishing positions last Wednesday. I thought that I had finished 16th in 17:56 but was given 17th in 18:00 - not a huge global scale tragedy it has to be said but more of a nagging crossword clue type scenario.
Anyway, after they did an investigation the guy supposedly in 16th had only completed two laps so everyone from 17th backwards is promoted a place and gets the time listed for the person in front - a very proactive response I thought.
Right, off to do the Eccup 10 as a leg stretcher (and to make sure Hilly doesnt race it
). 8 miles gently and a faster last couple of miles should be today's recipe.
Nice parkrunning as ever, good pb from MrV especially.
Hilly - Great news that it's coming back for racing.
Simon - That's a lot of MD'ing and sprinting in one day. Nice PB. And definitely no danger of me putting five of those reps together. I think I put down projected time 4.29.9, not that I've worked out pacing strategy yet.
I snuck in another 10 miler yesterday evening and I'm pretty sure that's the first time I've doubled-up on a Saturday, mainly in anticipation of going for a bike ride today. There's a rare break from the rain, and I thought I might be able to get my posh bike out but the roads still look a bit damp.
Nice racing Simon, and congrats on the new PB.
Also, good racing from Wardi, PP (24 laps - Yuck!) and Darola, and a great parkrun PB from Mr V.
Hilly - great to see you're feeling better. Hope the run today adds to that feeling
I've done my run for today, and did 20 miles at average 08:33/mile. I had hoped to do 22 miles, but slightly miscalculated the route and didn't have the mental strength to do a 2 mile detour once I got close to home. However, I may get out later today with my 7 yr old for a couple of laps around the park which will make up the missing 2 miles
Phil - on my run today I went past about 20 cyclists from some local club (Kingston something or other) who were doing a time trial. Lots of serious looking bikes, several of the riders were down on their TT bars, and there was a couple of full carbon discs on show plus plenty of the flashy carbon rimmed wheels that make that great "whoop whoop" noise as they go past.....
Will catch up later ... just back from Eccup 10M whre I spotted PRF & BR (Hilly was there too apparantly). Was looking to race this one but accidently went on the lash last nigh
t ... was at a party with a blues band playing and got sent home to get my guita so I could join in. Got on a bit of a high and 8 pints later I WAS Eric Clapton
. Bit grim this morning
... Eccup race down-graded to sub-LT session (7:17/m for 82% maxHR ). Cured the hangover though!
Good to meet up with Dr Dan and a host of other people this morning at the Eccup 10.
Eccup is a pretty tough course so there is usually a high percentage of the field using it for other purposes, although today it was the Yorkshire Championships for the first time.
My plan was just to have a bit of a play depending on how I felt once it was underway. I ambled the first mile with BR in 6:39 and we then decided that it would be fun to see how many people we could overtake from mile 1 to the finish.
I managed to go up from 144th to 58th for a net gain of 86 and BR probably just got over the 100. Well, you have to some fun somewhere.
71 of the overtakes were in one mile, the third in 5:42.
Overall though just a good workout without stressing anything too much.....and it was sunny, which made it very enoyable.
This is just to to say hello and keep up the good work to Hilly (too courageous for her own good!), Phil P (probably my best inspiration), PRF ( a man I'd really like to meet), Treadmill (David - good to see you still running quickly), Wardi (who's postings always make me feel better about myself) and all the other guys who keep this thread running.
Thanks to your efforts, I'm still running, allbeit slowly, but nevertheless with a bit more enthusiasm than I've had for a long time.
Tom - You'd only be diasppointed
Great to hear that your enthusiasm is rebuilding, its like a snowball once it gets going.
And congratulations on posting the 19,000th Middle Ground post. Gosh thats a lot.
A few pics of threadites from yesterday:
Myself and Mr V in black on the left, Hilly and BR over to the right and some numpty who forgot to tie his shoelaces about to get trampled
:
Mr V just behind the guy in blue, I'm just to his right and back 6 inches and BR over to the right. I note that both Mr V and BR are both at this stage eyeing up Mr Hagos with a view to taking him down:
This is what a 14:43 parkrun feels like:
But it doesnt feel half as good as taking Hilly down
:
Similar experience ... after doing almost 8/m for the first 2 miles, I then overtook between 110-120 people over the next 8 miles. I think 2-3 people went past me. It does makethings more fun.
Lovely storyboard there, prf. Nice racing and parkrunning by all over the w/e. Another PB, Simon/forever/whoever you are...? I have a strange sense that someone is Bubka-ing their 800s.
Longer weekend for me, with about 50 mins on Saturday and six miles with some 400s thrown in on the Sunday. Legs feel absolutely fine about doing extra miles.
Morning all! Busy weekend on here...
Phil some brilliant powers of recovery there and a doubling up on the Saturday - blimey I hope the legs arent too stiff today. How did the ride go? It was pretty dry yesterday (I did my lsr on the Thames Path from Woolwich to Earith and it didnt rain anyway).
Wardi good to see you getting back into it again - nice 37 secs to find on a waterlogged course.
Alehouse love that lap game.
Mr V awesome pb well done on running so well on a twisty course. Definitely more to come.
Hilly nice run (shame about the 14 year old!). Glad to hear you are getting back into it and feeling better.
Simon very clever racing to earn yourself a pb (I'm guessing thats quite a big pb for the track) - you'll get clubmate next time. What is the target for the 1500m then?
Good lsr YP did you make up the miles?
Dr. Dan I know how you feel re
. I went out on Friday night and had one too many gins and missed parkrun and then had to do my session in the afternoon feeling rather queasy at points...not fun!
Hello Tom good to see you back.
PRF only two races this weekend then
Loved the montage.
Good news your legs are fine Ratzer.
48 miles for me last week, 1 race, 1 multipace tempo and a 15 mile lsr. Things are going in the right direction I think. It will be weeks before I am back in any sort of shape so the half this weekend could be interesting!
prf - Excellent photo-journalism there. Is the girl who beat Hilly to the line doing a victory dance or has she got the strangest running gait in history?
YP - I'd like to get a wheel that goes whomm-whomm...or whatever, but they cost as much as a small family car. Maybe I'll just stick some papier mache over the spokes, I'm sure that'll be aero enough.
Curly - Good mileage there and a nice mixture. I topped off a 30 mile running weekend with a 43 mile bike ride yesterday and considering my lack of cycling miles recently, felt pretty fit, even going up the big hill. Wiggins is inspiring me at the moment, I might even grow the sideburns a bit more. Glad I left the posh bike at home, the weather was nice enough but the North West of Kent looks like it's still recovering from some serious downpours.
Wow 43 miles Phil
I am doing my first day tomorrow of 18 miles, but in three sections so shouldnt be too bad. Except we are cycling home from club which could be tough after a 5k speed endurance session 
MIDDLE GROUND WAVA LEAGUE (April- July)
Calculator here: http://www.howardgrubb.co.uk/athletics/wmalookup06.html
84.68% Hilly (5K, 19:20, April)
83.98% PhilPub (HM, 1:12:48, May)
83.19% BR (10K, 34:40, June)
81.22% PRF (10K, 36:37, June)
77.97% forever (10K, 42:34, April)
77.46% Duck (800m, 2'10.58, May)
77.17% Simon E (800m, 2'11.40 July)
74.50% YD (5K, 17:31, April)
73.94% Minni (10K, 42:57, April)
72.88% Mr V (5K, 17:42, July)
72.73% Ratzer (100m, 14.2, June)
71.95% Dash (10K, 39:47, April)
70.10% YoungPup (5K, 19:29, June)
68.63% Dr.Dan (5K, 20:40, June)
67.40% Darola (5K, 21:12, June)
64.94% CB (5K, 20:25, April)
Simon – Well done on another PB. You seem to run one every race at the moment. You are obviously in your peak race form right now (just in time for the Olympics.)
Ratzer – Sorry I just had to post the wava table again
Dan- Looks like a pretty good 10 miler with a hangover.
BR/PRF – Sounds like you enjoyed the overtaking game and a decent workout for you both.
Curly – If you keep that up for a few weeks I’m sure you’ll be flying again before long.
MIDDLE GROUND WAVA LEAGUE (April- July)
Calculator here: http://www.howardgrubb.co.uk/athletics/wmalookup06.html
84.68% Hilly (5K, 19:20, April)
83.98% PhilPub (HM, 1:12:48, May)
83.19% BR (10K, 34:40, June)
81.22% PRF (10K, 36:37, June)
77.97% forever (10K, 42:34, April)
77.46% Duck (800m, 2'10.58, May)
77.17% Simon E (800m, 2'11.40 July)
74.50% YD (5K, 17:31, April)
73.94% Minni (10K, 42:57, April)
72.88% Mr V (5K, 17:42, July)
72.73% Ratzer (100m, 14.2, June)
71.95% Dash (10K, 39:47, April)
70.10% YoungPup (5K, 19:29, June)
68.63% Dr.Dan (5K, 20:40, June)
67.40% Darola (5K, 21:12, June)
66.94% Curly (5k, 22:07, June)
64.94% CB (5K, 20:25, April)
Wardi, well done on a significant improvement there.
PRF, if I look back over my 800s this season then I have run better with even splits. I just didn't think I could run a second 66 lap after already running one, but I guess I was wrong.
Nice overtaking from Dr D and PRF. Do you agree that the boost that overtaking can give you is another argument for starting well within your limits?
Hilly, if fresh then I would hope that sub 4:30 is doable. Of course, being fresh isn't enough. I also need to get the pacing right,beb very motivated and probably have someone to race (Phil) on the last lap.
YP, very nice milage there and a good pace to hold. Going past the house is very dangerous on those long runs.
Ratzer, how did you find out about my deal with Nike?
Phil, I didn't realise entries closed at 5pm yesterday and I only just got mine in on time, I put down 4:29 as my target. There's another Croydon Harrier coming down who has run 4:29.5 this year.
Curly, my target at the start of the season was 4:27. Still doable as I have a few left, but at the moment I just want to get sub 4:30. According to age grading tables 1.2 seconds over 800 is roughly equivalent to 10 seconds over 5k. Sounds like an ideal week of training from you. I am sure your fitness will come back more quickly than you think it will.
I was shattered yesterday after Saturday's racing, but did an easy 6 miles. I'm even more shattered today. A day off is in order.
Right. It's on. Where can I race another 100??
Mr V really pleased to hear of your pb and sounds as if you weren't trying hard enough
Curly a very solid weeks training and nice to see your relaxed approach to racing
Simon getting a bit boring this
Well done again 
Dr Dan hehe never too old eh? Still a good 10 miler in the bag.
All good here I have the second of my 5k races on Wednesday but the weather isn't looking great. We shall see.
hey everyone, back from Edinburgh so a read back as to what's been going on then my report from yesterday.
Well done Simon, I knew there was a pb there! You seem to be mastering the art of the 800 negative split. Well done getting under 60 for the 400 too.
Nice racing at Eccup guys. BR/prf for their interesting contest & solid runs, and Dan for using it to get rid of a hangover!
19,000 posts? Gosh. And how much of it is pisstaking, prf's race reports, or talk about food?
Race report next, not a good day for pb attempts at all but retrospectively not a bad day.
Not a great day at Grangemouth yesterday at first glance but under the surface I think I can take heart from one of my races.
Wind was the name of the game yesterday, I kept sneaking glances at the wind meter on the front stretch and for most of the day they appeared to be well over 5 m/s - which is 11mph+. So a really strong headwind down the back straight meant any 400 pb attempt was going to be impossible.
Firstly the long jump, which I jumped a wind assisted 4.84m so doesn't count for a pb attempt unfortunately.
Then to the 400, my main aim of the day. Given the strong wind the aim was to really relax through 200m then push on and use the wind to my advantage.
Off we went (no blocks this time) and through 100m I was running pretty well, we hit the wind and things unravelled very quickly. Desspite making a conscious effort to hold back moreso than normal the wind was strength-sapping and I got to 200m feeling like hell. Dug in, got passed with 75m to go and really died in the final 10m. Finished feeling winded but not like I'd tried that hard - I had no strength to push on to really get into the fun oxygen debt. Time provisionally was 57.79 which is miles outside my pb, but the official results give it as 57.19 (perhaps I just read it wrong in that case) which is actually pretty good considering what I went through!
Then did the 200.... 26.05 which is 0.5s outside my pb and it was hugely wind assisted. Yes it was 25 mins after the 400 - which was probably half the reason - but I'd felt like I ran pretty well. Oh well.
So overall a bit of a frustrating day but nothing I could do about it.