Looking at the number of rest days, it looks like I’ve had a very lazy week this week! I can promise you that with the exception of Saturday (which was a VERY lazy day), it hasn’t felt like one! It’s looking more and more like I’m deviating from my original marathon training plan, and truth be told I am. I’m trying to concentrate on quality over quantity – I was finding as the long runs got longer that the ‘junk runs’ were just eating into my recovery time and sapping my energy, so with the exception of the odd mile or two along the river after work as a gentle pootle along, I’ve pretty much cut them out until I’m in my tapering period (which isn’t far away now!!!) and am just wanting to keep my trainers going.
Wednesday’s training session was an intervals session again – 4 mins effort along the main path up and down Blackhill Park and 2 mins recovery, six times. Last time I did an interval session I set off at a ridiculous pace, and as a result was about ready to pack in by lap 4 and my last two laps were at a normal jog – that felt like effort by that point! This time I set off much more steadily – still faster than my normal distance pace, but hopefully sustainable over a longer period with the breathers.
It does seem to have worked! With the exception of lap 4 where I must have remembered to push ‘lap’ but forgotten to have stopped my watch…I was going faster than that, I promise! N came with me for this one – her first training session – and I think she enjoyed it…after she’d got her breath back! I find it’s one of those sessions where I’m fine for the first 2-3 laps, but I have to start digging a bit deeper when I get to 4 and 5, and I’m relieved I’m nearly done by the last one!
I headed to the gym on Friday, hoping it would be quiet – it was – and I would be able to work through my whole circuit without melting into a puddle as I had last time I was there. In this, I was successful, but I fear I may have done a little too much for how tired I was feeling. Sleep did not come easy to me for some reason last week, a few too many silly little things floating around my head and building up on each other. Lots of frantic clean-all-the-things at work and knowing I had a mega-distance run on Sunday I suspect being rather large contributors for the other detritus to build on. I felt ok Friday evening and Saturday morning, but by Saturday afternoon and into Sunday morning my thighs were starting to feel rather stiff 😦 I blame the leg press.
I got up early on Sunday so I had plenty of time for breakfast, and was just about ready to go when P got home from work with the car. I was heading down to the finish line for the Bounders anniversary run at Blackhill Park, intending to run from there to somewhere near their start-line, meet them at about my 10 mile mark and turn round and come back (they were doing 11). This was also my first run where I would be trying Imodium V Nature Mk1, and for someone who doesn’t really like taking paracetamol let alone something for when I’m not ill, I wasn’t really relishing the prospect. I took one about half an hour before starting, and one halfway round – and it actually worked just fine. I don’t think I’ll bother with it once this is out the way as for 14 miles or less I seem to be more often than not fine, and I’m not intending to run more than that for a long time after this! It’s handy to have in the running box though.
Blue Runnings 