The only goals I have at the moment are to follow the plan and to get to the start injury free which is always easier said than done with Marathon training. As the weeks go by I'll try and give more insight into the different types of runs in the plan and why they are part of the plan. For the moment below is my first weeks training along with the small matter of the Star of the Sea 5K race.
Monday 27th May - Week 1 Day 1
Plan: Rest day
Actual: Rest day
Don't you just love training plans that start off with a rest day :-)
Tuesday 28th May - Week 1 Day 2
Plan: 13K w/6K @ Half Marathon Pace
Actual: 4K Warm up - Star of the Sea 5K - 1K Warm down
4K Warm Up
Avg Pace: 5:24
Avg HR: 136
5K in 21:39
Avg Pace: 4:20
Avg HR: 153
1K Warm Down
Avg Pace: 6:19
Avg HR: 126
So although the plan called for something different tonight was the first running of the Star of the Sea 5K road race so I couldn't miss that. There was speed work on the plan so this was a more than capable replacement. Wasn't sure what to expect having not run since last Wednesday and enjoying my weekend maybe a bit too much on the eating and drinking front but as always was going to give it a go and see what happened.
Got in a good warm up before hand consisting of a few laps of the track in St Pats GAA meeting up with a friend of mine Matt who had come out from town to support the race, and then making my way down to the start about a mile away outside Gormanston college. It was a lovely evening and to use horse racing terminology I was certainly sweating up in the paddock.
Everyone lined up just before the appointed start time and following a minutes silence for Maurice Hackett's mum we were underway. The first K took us over the M1 motorway with a bit of a rise followed by a downhill the far side. Checked the pace to make sure I hadn't gone off too fast and it seemed pretty ok. The road had by now flattened out as we headed towards Stamullen village and I passed the 1K mark in 4:09. This felt ok and didn't feel like I had gone out too fast.
The next K was about trying to keep control of the pace as we made our way into Stamullen and lots of support especially on the way into the village at the turn off for St Pat's. On past here and there was a nice incline through the village which zapped a bit of energy from the legs. As we made our way of the village I passed the 2K in 4:16. Was happy enough with this and hoped to be able to maintain this for the next couple of K.
We were now heading towards the entrance to St Claire's nursing home and although a slight incline it was nothing major. Swung into the grounds and had a nice flat/downhill run towards the actual home. The hill though had taken more out of me than I thought and when I even felt like I was moving slower even on the flat ground. Felt like stopping at this stage but that is pretty normal for a 5K. Plodded on and knew I was in trouble when the 3K split was 4:30.
Heading into St. Claire's between 2K&3K
Had pretty much given up on running a good time at this stage as we headed for the exit of St Claire's and another incline for a couple of hundred metres. Felt dead coming out the gate but knew it was flat/downhill from here to the last couple of hundred metres. Checked the watch and the pace had slipped to am embarrassing 4:50 pace. Tried to dig in as we headed back towards Stamullen and although hurting the pace started to come down. Passed a few people at this stage with the field well spread out by this stage. Recovered a bit to pass the 4K point with a 4:31 split.
Just the 1K to go now and just really wanted to reach the finish. Felt like I was plodding a bit and not making much progress. There was nobody within touching distance in front of me but I could hear a couple of people close behind me. Got down through the village holding them off and swung left for the uphill finish towards St Pats. Great support here again and got a lot of support but as too tired to have a look at where it was coming from. One guy came past me on the uphill but I tagged onto him as we closed in on the last 100 metres. Went past him again and held him off only to be passed by someone else finishing a lot faster than me. Ran the last K in 4:15 to finish overall in 81st place out of 360 odd runners in a time of 21:39.
With no expectations of time or anything I was happy enough with this and I suppose despite wanting to stop or feel like I was slowing down I did manage to dig in a bit and make it a worthwhile run.
Although I am biased this really was such a well run event, from registration to starting on time, marshaling on the route, course accurately measured and results available straight away afterwards. The spread in the clubhouse afterwards had to be seen to be believed with a mountain of food still left over after 360 runners had been fed and watered. Well done to everyone who had any part in making it all happen.
Wednesday 29th May - Week 1 Day 3
Plan: Rest day
Actual: Rest day
Thursday 30th May - Week 1 Day 4
Plan: 14K - General Aerobic
Actual: 14K
Avg Pace: 5:37
Avg HR: 137
Lovely evening for a run in the sun. Headed from Stamullen to Gormanston and a bit of a loop on the beach and back adding on a bit at the end to make up the distance. Bit of tiredness in the legs from the race but nothing major.
Friday 31st May - Week 1 Day 5
Plan: Rest
Actual: Club Session
Didn't think we'd have a session this week with the race but it was moved to Friday night :-(
3.9K warm up included a loop of the college grounds, stretching and a couple of laps of running the straight hard and the bend easy. The session was 3 sets of (1x1200m, 55 sec recovery, 1x300m) with a 3 minute recovery between each set.
Splits were (5:03,1:01;4:57,1:01;4:53,1:00)
A couple of laps then to warm down finishing with 9.33K for the session. This was a tough session but with any session the key is to be able to pace yourself right and run all the intervals close to the same pace/effort. Legs were pretty wrecked afterwards.
Saturday 1st June - Week 1 Day 6
Plan: 6K - Recovery Run
Actual: 5.3K Treadmill Run
As part of the local summer festival the local pub 'The White Hart Inn' was running a 24 hour treadmill run with the proceeds going to Crumlin childrens hospital & Balbriggan Cancer support group. I was assigned the 7am slot so just treated this as a recovery run. Great to get it out of the way so early but legs were in ribbons after the night before.
Sunday 2nd June - Week 1 Day 7
Plan: 19K - Long Run
Actual: 19.6K
Avg Pace: 5:39
Avg HR: 134
Another lovely morning when I set out from Stamullen for my long run. Was worried how the legs would hold up given how they felt the previous morning and while they were tired that is all it was. Headed towards Julianstown and then the back road to Laytown where I swung back and headed back towards Mosney and eventually back onto the main road at Murphy's quarry. From here I headed up towards the Delvin and back up around Gormanston College and back to the car. Probably could have done with a bit of water towards the end but felt fine afterwards.
Plan for the week was 4 runs and 53K, with the session as well as the race it was a tough enough week and ended up doing 5 days and around 58K in total. Back to 4 days this week before moving to 5 from the following week. Have my sister in laws 30th birthday party on Saturday night so will aim to get the runs out of the way and leave Sunday free for a rest day this week.
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