The Middle Ground

Sorry about that Stevie, as you're nearly 1% in front of me now it at least gives me something to work on.

Good work Bob, great feeling to be ahead of target.

PP.. if it's innuendo day I cannot help but observe that you got your long one in first thing this morning!  Nice pace for 21m.   

don't worry Wardi...i know I'm fighting a massive losing battle on this WAVA thing, especially with a summer of 5ks coming up that I don't necessarily keep my top figures for, so I need to stick up there why i can

Awesome running from Stevie at parkrun, and great time from Wardi too, but you realise you've just set my next target of course Sorry Snake Lane didnt go to plan, but kudos to you and Kelly for sticking out the tough stuff.

I'm more with Dash on the quiters side I have to say, although I've been doing a lot of work with Magpie to overcome some of those demons! Nice 12 miler Dash, but urgh to gel incident (although if you were a woman you'd be used to sticky mess hitting the back of the throat at speed ). I've still never had a gel!

BBB wow well done. Brilliant first outing to the distance. You definitely fit in here now

Alehouse whoot to your first race back. Hope the walk went well today.

Phil hope the woozy head wasnt too bad, which bourbon is to blame?

21 miles for me this morning, out the door at 7am for:
7 miles @ 8:51 (easy), 7 @ 8:07 (steady), 6 @ 7:31 (MP), cd

It felt good, running was relaxed and strong, I could talk without problem so a real confidence boost overall. Am a bit tired now after a shift at work but okay. Think it was the post run brunch of lambs liver, mushrooms, onions, tomatoes and egg on toast. Nommmmm

Nice running YP - how did the 10 @ MP feel towards the end?

Your triad of marathon mistakes did make me smile, although I'm sure it wasnt funny at the time!

I see the woman I beat at Nonsuch last week ran 19:41 this week. Drat to having other stuff to do as I suspect it would have been a great race between us...

YP thats okay re: slightly lower than you wanted pace wise at this stage of training, its the feeling like you could do more thats the good sign. 10m @ MP is a big chunk and is tough so well done!

YoungPup wrote (see)

Cheers Curly - I knew that I just wanted to have a positive run, and whilst my plan was to do 10@9m/m followed by 10@07:30, I ended up shaving 3 mins of the first 10m and taking 3 mins more on the 2nd 10m. However, the end result is the same, and because of my calf pull this was the first 20 of this marathon campaign, so I'm relaxed about the paces...

I feel as though I am ever so slightly behind the curve in terms of where I would like to be with my marathon training, but according to prf (on the Kier mentoring thread) this is a good way to feel....? I also have 3 more weeks than most, as MK is not until 6th May

Great 21 from you today - are you getting close to firming up on your target for Brighton?

Indeed - its better to be slightly behind now than overcooked come race day.

Lalalala sorry cant hear you

My lord, I'm reading the innuendo, and the tv shampoo ad is inciting a "I'd like to insert some serum into my eyes" line from my housemate: I feel like I'm in a Carry On movie.

Well done, BBB, hope that warm glow lasts all week at least. And great to see SG knock off a sub 17 5k - with that done, onward to the next one!

I'm having an odd few weeks. Been a regular at the physio for a knee thing, which is definitely getting better, and has me running, but only at up to steady pace. My legs are fantastically tired, perhaps that's the physio exercises on top of a fair few miles, as I've got back up to 50 a week.

Yesterday I ran the G3 in Guildford. I love these races. Organised by all about triathlons, and the field is mostly triathletes, for a brutal off road 10kish (yesterday I clocked at 10.8). That gives it a nice feel; some quick people up the front, but a lot of people with a kind of "just running?! What larks" attitude. The 8.30 start time clashes with parkrun, so I've been giving them a miss, but now I'm a vet I thought there might be a pot hunting opportunity. All depends on who shows up, of course, and with me being unable to recognise a V40, my off road shoes being out of action and my lovely new grippy fell shoes being elsewhere I started in racing flats in about the 7th rank. A bit foolish, had to race through a lot of people, but it was a good feeling passing the field by going through the mud while those in trail shoes were heading round the edges.

After a 6.03 first mile I was still a fair way down and wondered why - the stats later showed we'd dropped 200 feet! I slowed but carried on picking people off, with the racing flats only a minor disadvantage. The whole thing has some fairly serious climbs - I had a walk at 7k, as did the fleet footed first lady up ahead.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/279495647

At the end you can see your result, but with no age categories, and no obvious prize giving, I knew I was 11th but still didn't know how I'd done overall. Later on, I found - 1st vet! At the risk of putting this on PP and others' radar, that should mean a £60 voucher heading my way in the post, and a very successful pot hunt.

Then today I was sore enough that 20miles seemed a stretch, and then my tummy decided that leaving the house was definitely not on. Flip!

Afternoon everyone... busy weekend but time to catch up now.

Stevie, big shock with stuff like 400/800 is the oxygen debt. It really hits you like having a door hit you!

Congrats on the pb as well, you'll knock the 16'xxs out now every week, guaranteed 

Dan, 6:68/m is pretty impressive  shame the month hasn't gone to plan but you've shown in the past you can get back up to speed well, so hopefully you can do the same now.

Nicely done paerkrun alehouse, keep the progress going!

Wardi, goes to show the rollercoaster of racing. Excellent parkrun, hopefully snake lane was just a day off for the longer stuff.

BBB, that's great off 3 months training. Well done!

Curly, must be close to nailing down MP now given that session?

Ended up with 17M for last week - it was a cutback  I'm now into pre-comp and starting to build specific endurance for the track season. 

Did the traditional spectators job at Smokies 10 yesterday. Mum wasn't running but did spy Mrs Dolittle (if you remember her from a while back) - she picked up an individual and team prize! Didn't get a chance to speak to her though.

Thanks for the comments, folks.  

Dash - yep - that's why I'm here! Curly - Cheers. Was acutely aware that I was probably strong arming my way in here a bit early, but could see that there's plenty, yourself included, who had taken the journey I want to take myself to getting themselves faster through smarter running. Really grateful for the time you've all taken to steer me so far, and whilst I was itching to hit some harder miles over the last 2/3 weeks, the worth of keeping a lid on it was proven yesterday, as I got to the start line not only in one piece, but chomping at the bit with fresh legs.

Congrats also to those with good races this weekend, Wardi, YP and T'Other Man and well done to Kelly for sticking it out. Some good training as usual as well, though Phil's starting to annoy me with his ability to burn the candle at both ends! Necking several of my favourite beers, and then nonchalantly shrugging them off by sticking in 21 swift training miles! 

So, race report - was too knackered last night - I now know what 'race beat' means. 

Had a Garmin disaster at the start as I bumped into one of the lads from our cricket club who is a keen runner, and had to go through the 'what the feck are you doing here?!' routine with him and explained that I'd just got into it. While we were gassing, the Garmin that I'd put into training mode, switched back to sleep mode, only realising as the gun went off, and was then fumbling with unlocking the bezel, re-entering training mode and so on as I jogged the first couple of hundred yards. 

That had let plenty of duffers past me, so ended up in a bit of a bottleneck, and once the watch was going and I was passing them again, realised I was doing some suicidal, crazy sheeeeet sub 7-minute mile pace, only slowing enough to complete the first (Garmin) clocked mile in 7.03. Too fast! But felt quite comfortable all the same.

Then got myself into a rhythm with a steady group of runners in club shirts - thought they'd be reasonable to tuck in with and so it proved, knocking out both miles 2 and 3 at 7:26 pace. Still quicker than I'd planned, but not too crazy, and still feeling pretty good. The next couple of miles did slow (7:33 and 7:34) with a bit of a climb in mile 5 hurting me and it was tough from there on, but given the earlier miles knew I was well on course for my target or better.

The group I was in then began to run out of steam, and I'd noticed a guy who had been consistently narrowly beating me at parkrun come past me at about the 4 mile mark. As he'd hitched a ride on me for at least half of one of those parkruns, and had beaten me by a second that day, I decided it was time to turn the tables, so left the group I was running with behind, caught up with him and let him do the work this time.

Was tough keeping it going by now, but with Dash's 'embrace the hurt, embrace the hurt' mantra repeating round my noggin, that 6th mile saw an acceleration to 7:11 pace! Although it was difficult to think straight at this point, I think I realised that sub-46 was on the cards, and internal 'embrace the hurt' was replaced with several repetitions of 'COME ON!' under my breath...or so I thought until someone turned round to look at me! 

Rounding the final corner and on to a grassy straight to the line, I was still on that bugger from parkrun's shoulder, summoned up the last of my energy, and hit the gas - was amazed to find just how much there was.

Continues...

November races are gone ... and I've dropped 3-4% to below 70%. I'll have to get in a good 10K at Bradford in a few weeks time.

__________________________________________________

MIDDLE GROUND WAVA LEAGUE (December-March) Calculator here:http://www.howardgrubb.co.uk/athletics/wmalookup06.html

85.79% PhilPub (10k, 33:07, February)
82.34% Hilly (10M, 66:45, December)

79.26% Duck (60m, 8.1, December)
78.16% SG   (HM, 75:41, February)
77.86% PRF (10K, 38:12, February)
77.35% Wardi (5K 19:52 March)
77.08% YD  (10K, 35:24, February)
73.84% Curly45 (5K 20:03, February)

69.98% Dr.Dan (10M, 69:42, February)

59.56% CB (10K, 46:20, December)
57.16% Alehouse (5K 27:49 March)

Need to add one back in:
BR, Simon, Ratzer, YoungPup, Dash, dav3c, RobT, Minni, MrV

Continued...

Looking at the Garmin download, I moved from 7:00 mile pace, through to 6:38 over the next 7 seconds, left parkrun dude for dead, found another gear again over the next 7 seconds to get to 5:00 mile pace, passing several other runners (nobody was coming past me now!) and held that and more for the final 25 seconds actually breaking the line at 4:27 mile pace! WTF?! 

Final chip time of 45:40 and 126th of 716 finishers on the day.

Looking at the Garmin elevation profile late last night after I finally summoned the energy to download it, I couldn't work out why there was an apparent 'dip' at the finish line where none exists...then realised that must be where I'd thrown myself to the floor in exhaustion after the lung busting finish!

Next thing I remember is my old man leaning over me apologising for laughing his head off and choking out a well done on a wild eyed finish. He was a 4:30 miler in his youth, and is delighted that I've finally got into running, albeit rather late in life.

All in all, bloody great stuff. I've enjoyed my parkrunning, but this was different gravy altogether. Can't wait for my next one.

Must add myself into that WAVA table later. 

Oh, and in case anyone's interested - here's what the Garmin recorded - including the evidence of the balls up at the start line...the race did in fact Start and Finish at exactly the same spot!

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/280118863

BBB – Sounds like you enjoyed that one and a massive chunk under what you were predicting. Next target sub 45

Dan – At least you have a wava entry! My only eligible time is a parkrun tempo run. Can we add an excuses column on the end of the table

Duck – What’s the session focus in this phase of things then? When will you be looking to peak?

TOM – Good effort there – can’t complain at a £60 quid voucher....

45 miles clocked up last week so I think I’ve broken the back of this injury now. Added what I thought was a fastish last mile at the end of yesterday’s run only to see the garmin beep at 7.00! Oh dear.... Think I’ll have a bash at parkrun on Saturday to see where I’m at.  I suspect it may not make enjoyable reading

Ooh, yes please on the excuses front! Had some halfway decent WAVA scores last year, but not so much this time around. I've decided that some innoculations I had last week are to blame for my malaise, so have let myself off. Gone from a lovely race to having 3 miles at 9m/m be a serious effort this morning! And yes, Dash, i think that's exactly where it'll go; love the phrasing.

Good training, Mr V, you ought to start really feeling fit now, if there's any justice.

Nice race report, BBB, and that's not too shabby at all - beat your target, and yet have some fairly obvious (with no offence intended) consistency to aim for to top it next time! I always think it's good to try a few different approaches; going out hard, deliberately holding back, and so on, but to my mind you absolutely cannot beat a rival coming past, hanging on and then storming past for a good performance, and feeling like it was the same.

Good luck with stepping up into comp mode, Duck and at Bradford Dr Dan.

Mr Viper wrote (see)

Dan – At least you have a wava entry! My only eligible time is a parkrun tempo run. Can we add an excuses column on the end of the table

Can you put me there too?  If I put down my 600m (and yes, a WAVA does exist for those lunatics that put on races between sprinters and MDers) it would be a slightly glossy view of the true state of play.  Next race is the big one, so I don't foresee a WAVA starting with a 7.

BBB, racing can be even more enjoyable than just running, can't it?  And that sounded like a great race!

Nice one, TOM.

Ten miles for me tonight.  Great test of the willpower as I got off the treadmill after 45mins for a wee and still got back onto it again!  Can someone explain to me why, if there are eight treadmills and only mine is being used, that short, fat bloke climbs onto the one next to mine to take a walk?  Right, bedtime, as I've got to be back on that treadmill in the morning...

BBB, good report. Going off too fast is very easy to do (as we all well know ), but you recovered well by running off those in front. As for the finish... want to try an open 400? 

Mr V - good news on a breakthrough week! I'll answer your question below as I have a bit to talk about regarding training now.

Ratzer, 10 on a treadmill? I'm bored just thinking about that  

So a bit of self-indulgence now.

The plan basically from now on is to whip myself into 400/800 shape, which isn't quite as easy as it sounds. Were I running 800/1500 it would be a fairly simple matter of keeping a respectable amount of mileage, nailing the 300s/800s/1ks etc with a bit of quicker than 800 pace thrown in (probably in the form of open 200s/400s). 

However just 1 lap of the track can make quite a difference to training. 400/800 really is a crossover in terms of running, going from sprints to endurance - which requires quite a change in philosophy (as someone said to me once: "take endurance training, take the complete opposite and you've found sprint training"). 

I've done quite a bit of reading into the training of Juantorema, Cruz, Solomon etc (all 400/800 types) and the big thing that separates the training is lower volume with higher intensity (i.e. faster) repeats. 

A traditional sub-2'04 800 workout (for your 800/1500 type) might be something like 2*5*200 in 31s, w/60s between reps + 3-4'00 between sets. My sessions now will be slightly different - I have sessions like 3*3*200 in 29-30s w/45s between reps + 3'00 between sets planned. 

Now a 400 runner might do sessions like 2*300 w/10'00 rec (not coincidentally I have this exact session planned) - low volume but very high intensity. So what I've essentially tried to do is combine both approaches to find a middle ground that will provide the endurance which I undoubtedly need, along with the high intensity/low volume sprint approach. 

Along with this I'm keeping over-distance stuff going too for longer specific endurance training (which will help in the final 100/200m). Sessions like 600s in 1'41, 500s in 1'20 (both w/long rec), and mile paced workouts of course will help here. 

Later on in training I'll be doing more traditional 800 workouts like 4*400, 2*600 etc, but for the most part I'll be working around 600m pace which is speed training for the 800 and stamina training for the 400. 

Later on there will be max speed endurance workouts as well. I've put it on google docs if anyone want to have a look.