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10 years off...
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Decided not to do the parkrun on Saturday and stuck with the schedule above. Went for an easy 3 miles on Friday evening, did 6 on Saturday then took a rest day on Sunday. Intervals tonight.
My cold hasn't gotten any worse so hopefully I'll be fully fit for the parkrun next weekend and to get a sub 20 minute time.
Did an interval session last night; 3 x 3 x 400m.
Fist set were done at 5km race pace with 100m jog recovery.
Second set 2-3 seconds faster with 200m jog recovery.
And final set 2-3 seconds quicker again with 400m jog recovery.
Going out for a longish run tonight, somewhere between 8km and 12km, then another easy interval session on Wednesday, a really easy 2 miles on Friday and then the sub 20 minute parkrun on Saturday morning!
How did the intervals feel? Did you manage to maintain pace right to the last one?
Good luck for Saturday!
Intervals felt nice and easy, was a bit annoying not having a track so I just used my Garmin to pace out 600m making a note of where each 100m marker was.
I did a good 2 mile warmup but my first interval was still a bit slow, all the rest were good though and I finished feeling like I could have done more.
I did an interval session last week which was probably way too fast; 5 x 1km @ closer to 18 minute pace than 20 minute pace and I felt it for days afterwards and thinking about it now it may have contributed to me thinking I was coming down with a cold! So lesson learned and a much more steady session last night has left me still feeling fresh this morning.
Thanks for the good luck Nessie, I'll report back on Saturday afternoon hopefully with a new (sub 20 minute) 5km PB
I'll keep my fnigners crossed for you......
Went for an easy 5 miles on Tuesday and did a similar interval session to the last one last night but fewer reps and shorter distances; 3 x 2 x 200m starting at 5k pace and getting faster.
Going to rest tonight and then tomorrow I'll go through the warm up I plan to do before my race on Saturday; 2 miles slow then some stretching then some strides.
Still feel like I've got a slight cold, maybe it's hayfever. Hopefully it won't affect me too much when I do my race.
Could well be hayfever, listening to the weatherforecasters go on about it. Hope your brother has similar genes!
So I had my final 5km race this morning before I go away on holiday where I'll be racing my family in a 4.5km race. I'd set the target of going sub 20 before I go away, which I think would mean I'm in good enough shape to win it. My one and only 5km time is from a parkrun I did 2 weeks ago; 20:15, so having done a decent 2 weeks of training since then I was quietly confident I'd be able to crack 20 mins.
I got up early nursing a slight hangover but after two cups of coffee, a banana and lots of water I felt fine and left the house to set off on my warm up; a slow mile and a half jog to the park. I did a bit of stretching and some strides and then took my place on the startline.
I started quickly again and soon found myself at the back of a group of about 10 runners, the first km is a long straight so I couldn't really tell how many people were ahead of me but as we went round the first corner to my surprise the group I was at the back of was in fact the lead group. A quick glance at my watch told me I'd gone through the first km in 3:38; way ahead of the pace I was aiming for. The next group of runners were quite far behind and I didn't want to be running on my own so I decided to keep the pace going and stick with the lead group for as long as I could.
By the time we got to the 2km marker we'd split into 3 smaller groups; one guy out in front on his own, a group of four or five about 30 metres back and the group of 3 that I was in. I was starting to feel it now, and the headwind that we were running into didn't help, but I knew I had to stay with this group for as long as I could. Second km split was 3:43.
Thankfully over the next 2km the pace dropped a bit as we went through both in 3:56. I was into the last km now and felt strong, after a couple of twists and turns the course finishes with a long straight of about 500m. At this point I kicked on an overtook the two other guys I'd been running with. I knew I was in for a fast time as they both had club vests on, and I even got some encouragement from one as I overtook him which was nice and spurred me on even more.
I crossed the line in 6th position with a time of 18:47, and a final 1km split of 3:37.
Really pleased with this time, even though my splits were a bit all over the place (3:38, 3:43, 3:56, 3:56, 3:37) I think I ran the best race I could have; I find it much easier running in a group and I don't think I'd have been able to run anywhere near that quickly if I'd tried to run even splits.
So I'm confident I'm in shape to beat my brother now, I think his best time is around 20:30 for 5km. I'm not too sure which day we'll be doing our race so between now and when we go away on Thursday I'm just going to get some more miles in, aiming for about 20 miles in 3 runs unless anyone else has any suggestions..
Thanks to everyone, especially Nose Nowt, who gave me training advice and encouragement.
Time to relax now and enjoy the rest of my holiday!
Tie a ribbon to your trophy, and wear it round your neck for the entire holiday!
Cracking time for the Park Run and great to win the race today. But beating him by four minutes takes the gloss off it a bit. You really didn't need to go to all that trouble over the last few weeks!
Well done, and hope you fall in love with running again.
Brilliant - both the parkrun time and in beating your family.
I disagree with Nose Nowt - 4 minutes is really rubbing your brother's nose in it. If you'd only beaten him by seconds he could have claimed that he let you win.
Hope the rest of the holiday was as good!
Thank you both for your kind words.
The challenge is over so I won't be updating this thread anymore, however I have decided to continue with the running. I've set myself a 16 week program in the hope of getting my 5km time as low as possible, hopefully somewhere around the 17 minute mark.
I'm going to do a 5km park run every 4th week so my schedule will look something like this:
Weeks 1-4 - Starting off at 50km per week and building up to 80km per week by week 4, all slow runs of between 8km and 16km with a slight taper week before the 5km parkrun.
Weeks 5-8 - 80km each week, again just slow runs with a slight taper and a 5km parkrun at the end of week 8.
Weeks 9-12 - Cut the miles (or km's) down to 60-70km and add in one temp run each week with a parkrun at the end of week 12.
Weeks 13-16 - Cut the slow miles down to 50km per week and add in an interval session or two per week as well as the tempo, with one final parkrun at the end.
So the first 8 weeks will just be base building with the harder/faster stuff coming in during the second half of the program. If I can get my time down towards 17 mins then I should be in with a chance of winning one of these parkruns, which would be amazing!