RW Forum Six – Sub 4 Running Rachel with Cheerful Dave

My Sunday run is my long run, sorry, forgot to mention! Good plan, will do similar!

Did my hill session tonight having switched with my MLR so I wasn't running 2 consecutive speed sessions.

I think it helped as I felt I had a much higher quality session of hills tonight - ran 16 x 100 reps rather than the usual 10 x100 and at a higher intensity and felt good.

Rest day tomorrow, 8 mls saturday & another 20 miler on Sunday ... then cut back week..

RTTW - Welcome. Some good advice can be found on here from people far more qualified than me. But sounds like you are on the right track.

Ricky - well done on the hill session tonight.

Artic conditions over here. Reckon it was the coldest night I have ever gone out running. Once or twice I was being blown sideways and I was running at the time. Pure madness.

Got a interval session in tonight but reduced it so as to ease up before Sunday.

Messed up the settings on my new garmin so did not record the splits of my session correctly. So from looking at the data it was something like this.

1.5 mile wu at 8:45 mm. 3 a 1km reps each about 7:30 ish min/mile followed by a 1.5 mile (ish) cool down.

I was aiming to do the 1km reps at HMP but was a little faster than planned. I wasn't uncomfortable at this pace as I normally would do intervals faster but it was hard to judghe as with the wind I needed to focus on driving it out.

Rest for the next 2 days to continue with my recovery from manflu and hopefully gain some more strength back before the HM. If it is this cold it will be horrible.

Any advice on carb loading for a hM ? Is it the same principle as for a marathon but just a little less ? I hate carb loading. Pasta is not my favorite food.

Some good running here! Crazy cold - sometimes it's nice to be out in the cold, most of the time it's just crazy. Running with snow this morning was bitterly!!

Frustrated with my knee. Ongoing niggle. Not painful but stiff and uncomfortable. Located the problem to tight quads thus making my knee quite stiff even when I've rested it. Takes about 3-4 miles to get into a run and for it to no longer feel uncomfortable. After that's its completely fine unless I have to wait too long at a crossing. Really frustrating as not painful, just stiff and frustrating. Meant my recent runs have been quite slow, but after the first 3 miles things get much easier. Been getting the foam roller out which helps a bit, but mostly just frustrating!

Hope everyone has a good friday  

Ooh, Carl's got a new garmin!  Go on, which one did you get?  Nice intervals BTW.

Carb loading for a half?  I'm not a nutrition expert, but I'd say yes, you probably won't go far wrong using the same principles as you do for a marathon, but scaled down a little.  Same with gels etc during the race.  That's what I do anyway.  Good practice for the big one if nothing else.  Try & keep the same pre-race ritual as you will for your marathon - not easy because I guess timings and travel arrangements will be different.

Careful with those quads RWTW, it can lead to all sorts of issues which in the worst case will stop you running.  ITBS for example, you don't want to go there.  Try the roller & stretching before you run (don't overdo the stretching when you're cold though!) and maybe stop to stretch it out after a mile or two warmup.  Especially important if you're running first thing in the morning, and not helped by the cold weather. 

Hot baths are also good for loosening leg muscles up, I've found, try one of those last thing at night.

Thanks Dave. Yeah...i've had ITB/hip problems on the other side, so don't know if this is over compensation for previous problems? Yeah the cold weather definitely doesn't help...neither does stopping for crossings! Tends to feel much loose after the first few miles, so that's good, just frustrating!! Makes me miss swimming and the lack of joint issues!

Dave - got a good deal on the new model. Just need to spend more time learning how to use it !!

Dd1969 - the unforced rest may help as you will be quite fresh. Best of luck.

Dd, you will probably really benefit from the rest as the others have said. One thing I've learnt recently is that there is no point feeling guilty about not getting out to run. Life happens! I was an utter slave to the marathon schedule last time, to the degree that I was getting up at a ridiculous hour when we were  on holiday in the south of France and at one point running MANY loops round a small camp site to cover the approriate distance. 

I am planning to get out again in the morning. Since it turned colder again this week, I only got out on Tuesday. I'm hoping to get out more next week and may try to get back into early morning running as it definitely works best for me! 

Tempo run: 4 miles at 7:52 min mile. Wooooooooooohooooooooooooo. Long run planned tomorrow! 

Seems like the rest has done you good Rachel, that's a good pace.  Like Dd says, nice and easy tomorrow.

Good luck to the HMers tomorrow, it'll be cold but otherwise decent conditions.

Collected my race number today and had a drive around the bits of the course I could get to.

What a course. Forget the PB. Forget getting close to my previous PB. Surviving and finishing will be a success in itself.

The first mile or so is all uphill to get over a motorway before joining a narrow road that will be open to traffic. It is also on a narrow pathway more or less from the start.

Next 2/3 miles to the first village have 2 hills. These are proper hills but nothing compared to what comes later. Only good thing is that what goes up has to come down so if I resist the temptation to go crazy I can try and get some time back on these downhill bits.

Then there is a short section through some fields that avoids a twist severely hilly section (which I will cover on the return).

Then it is another climb before it plateaus as it comes into the next viallge. Then a section through some woodds and turning to head back for home.

Back through village number 2 but then take a fork in the road and descends for a good mile or so with some sharp bends before hitting a T junction.on a hill. This is the start of the 3/4 mile climb and this is brutal. There is a bit of a flat section part way up but that is before the steep section into villge number 1.

Then back downhill up and over the 2 hills in reverse and then downhill along the narrow path back to the start / finish area.

So is it a good thing that I know this is a really tough course.

Proabaly.

I think I cannot run this to any particular pace as there are just too many hills / bends / uneven stuff.

I will have to run to feel. If I can be sensible on the early downhill sections and not go crazy but use them to balance out the early uphills, use the flat sections to recover, I may be able to get to the climb at mile 10 in reasoanable shape. But I will be hurting. If I can get over this with enough in the tank I can try and strike out for home.

My PB is 1:47 but I think that anything around the 1: 55 mark would be acceptable. 

My mindset will be more along the lines of this being a hard training session rather than a race. 

Rachel - well done on your session today. That was some fast miles. Must be a good feeling to know that you still have that in you.

Running to feel will be no bad thing Carl, all good experience.  As you say, not one to be worried too much about the final time.  Try & enjoy it, & finish strong.