Talkback: ASICS Target 26.2 Team: Emma

mcs - nice article and photo on P91 of RW mag - at this rate you'll be vying for Editor!!

Lovely 7 mile hill run at MP+10secs with 7 min strong uphill.  Managed to avoid the rain storms which is the beauty of being retired.  I love getting back from an afternoon run at this time of year as the day darkens and I get stuck into soup, crumpets, cake and loads of tea..  Makes the evening Guinness taste better as well !!

Am thinking about doing a marathon a couple of months after the spring one (May 6th) - not a PB one but an interest one to use the benefit of the early year training and after a recovery period - saw an advert for the Lakeland Trail Marathon at Coniston on July 1st - mcs, do you know anything about this one ?

Great - just looked at my meetings for January and I have two parents evenings to deal with - so training already being juggled!

I suppose that's my category!

mcs wrote (see)

Running home tonight four miles minimum at 5pm so will be out in the wind and rain with you Emma in spirit. Check out page 91 to see me and my daughter in the Feb RW mag and page 53 being quoted at the Birmingham boot camp day.......just like to say that I did make some comments about Steve and Sam too but they have been edited!!!

To quote my new desk calendar(sorry if they bore you, I wont mention them every day promise!)

No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another.

Hope they were nice comments, mcs

Emma, oh you poor thing. It's tough innit, marathon training. Let me know if I can help you reschedule the sessions.

I'll ask Alice about my copy of RW - deliberately didn't ask for subscription for Christmas as I thought it was one of the goodies! Is there a bootcamp write up then?

Thanks for the positivity for tonight's run - plan was 1 mile jog, 3 miles at 1/2 pace followed by 1 (or 2 not totally clear) miles jog recovery.

The Garmin say ...

10:41,8:48, 8:49, 8:34 ,11:15, 9:45 

Hoorah! - I was rather slow in the warm up (found it hard to get going) and don't know what happened in mile 5 (might have stopped for a gossip or for lights?!) but last mile better. Really pleased with the mid section - although I did think 'not a chance I could do this for another 10 miles'! So faster than 1/2 marathon pace really - but I'm pleased that I was able to pick up pace a bit (also a gentle down hill for a fair bit - maybe do the route in reverse next time and see if there is much change) especially as I have been feeling so tired!

2 runs down - 2 more to go for the week!

Nice run tonight Emma.

I was feeling antisocial so didn't go to intervals at my club tonight but  went out and did sort of fartlek for about 8 miles instead.  There were patches where the naff street lighting meant no chance to go faster in case I fell over!

Good idea to ask Alice about the subscription.  Mine started partway into last year but that may have been because I already had one paying quarterly and it needed to get to the end of what i had already paid for.

Emma - great run last night - the most important part was the middle 3 at half pace and you did that at a good pace so well done - don't worry about the splits on the 2 mile recovery cos it's just that i.e. "recovery"

 There is a 4 page spread of boot camp in the feb RW but the big one for you is next months when they are going to profile the 5 selected - exciting eh?

Thanks for the info Oscarr - I will look horrid in the photos! (Brucie with a blonde wig!).

Bootcamp will be great to read - what a mad day that was. So many lovely smiley and nervous people!

The recovery was all over the place but I was really chuffed with the middle section... but no way could have done that for 10 more miles. Watford soon!

Hello Emma, well done on the pacey session.

However.... !!!!! 8.48, 8.49, 8.34 is considerably faster than the recommended pace. Your current half mara pace is about 9.14 per mile and the range is 9 to 9.15 so don't worry about it feeling tough right now. The goal pace (as in, once you've done some consistent weeks of focused training) is 8.40 per mile but you are not meant to be able to do that right from the off.

I think this raises a good point for everyone, actually. There's no need to run sessions faster than suggested, just because you can - whether it's an easy run or a tempo run or interval session. When you think about it, 'half marathon pace' shouldn't feel TOO hard, otherwise how would you be able to do it for 13.1 miles?

Only if sessions feel ridiculously easy might you think about upping your pace, but at the same time you'd probably be wanting to adjust your ultimate goal, too.

Thanks Sam - got a bit carried away - and there were some fairly substantial sections that were down hill so timings are probably a little skewed. I have a similar session in next weeks schedule so will run route in reverse and see how that affects my pace for same perceived effort.

I am definitely feeling a difference in the running that I have been doing - even though there isn't lots more in terms of distance the runs are definitely harder and I can feel that I have worked harder (especially trying to get out of bed in the morning).

Will try to stick better to the target paces - I shot off like a rocket for the first 1/2 mile last night as I couldn't read my Garmin! Running like a fool until I realised I was at 10k pace! Will aim to use more of my perceived pace for 1/2 marathon - this should feel fairly comfortable shouldn't it?

Experimenting with the idea of running the 10 miler on Saturday along the Downs link which should be lovely and flat ... however I am relying on my running partner to be able to hit 10 min miles as there will be lots of horses and doggies along that route. She is my human shield for any canine or equine encounters!

Rest and strength tonight - along with Upper 6th Mock marking!

Half marathon pace should feel reasonably comfortable - for very fast runners it might tally with threshold(tempo) pace but for anyone running a half in 1.30 or more, it should be slower than tempo pace, which I describe as 'comfortably hard' or 'controlled discomfort.'

Enjoy the rest tonight!

Hi Nicole - good to hear from you!

How is your training going - my schedule has been a shock to the system... but that is the idea - otherwise I would achieve what I managed to achieve last year!

So worried about my dodgy pictures in RW - the one on the website was awful. I used to think it was because OI wasn't photogenic. Now I think actually that's just how I look!

Sam- are you saying that we should alter our paces as the training goes on? ie that we should be going slower than the stated pace to begin with, and work towards the final "correct" pace over the weeks?

I can see the logic of this, but I'd always assumed that you stick to what it tells you to do, and the schedule takes care of increasing the paces steadily over the weeks- I'm sure some of the plans I've used in the past have done this.

Feeling abit knackered so just had a three mile speedy run down town to the bank instead of the five I was going to do at lunch..........didnt wake up this morning and I was in bed at 9.45pm and woke up at 8am crazy........too much running!!! 17 miles so far this week.........

No need to worry about your pic mine in the mag with my daughter is when I was bad with my back and hadn't run for ages so felt rubbish and have you seen my ears!! 

Whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing well.

The comments were all good Sam of course!!!!

Has anyone put expenses into Asics for travelling?

Must stick to the paces on the schedule instead of going too fast as I always do.........