So last weeks blog turned into an epic essay, much like writing a chapter for my thesis again. Don't have the time for that this weekend so going to attempt to keep things short and sweet. It has been an awesome weekend, the sun has been out and it felt like summer. Just what I needed to spur me on the spend most of the weekend outside.
The week kicked off with swimming on Tuesdsy night, after blistering my instep last weekend my foot was causing some issues in the early part of the week. Needless to say I am not a fan of Compeed and don't intend to buy more anytime soon. Sainsbury's blister plasters are perfectly good thank you. Anyway, the swim session, well it felt horrible, I had absolutely no energy and the 100-200m sets took there toll. Swimming 15 hours after getting up for work isn't always the best idea.
Wednesday was the first of the gorgeous days. Due to the sodding blister I decided a turbo set was in order. Local Hero it was going to be, I had to find out if I would be a hero in the hearts of the Sufferlandrians. After last weeks learning experience I was better prepared, lights off, window open, heating off 1.5 litres of fluid and 2 sweat rags. It actually felt easier. Average and max heart rates were a bit lower, but distance covered in the session was more. Hmm, maybe I'm starting to get fit. Of course with the window open the outside was calling and I thought I'd turn it into a brick session. Not the best decision to make 60 minutes after starting a workout. After a 10 minute transition (25% of which was waiting for the 310XT to get a GPS lock) I was off. Still had jelly legs but ran a good first km, the fastest in fact. Got a nice large loop of The Common in clocking up 6km for my efforts, at a respectable pace of 4m54 s/km. Off course when I got in the shower the impromptu nature of this brick session came and bit me in the behind, quite literally! Should have bodyglided the chamois in the tri shorts, apparently there is a seam that doesn't like me.
Thursday and there was to be no after work turbo, had planned on Revolver, forgetting I was going to stay at work for a webinar. Oh well. Arrived home to find two cards from Royal Fail on the doormat and a courier packet. My new Bluesenty swim gloves and Element goggles. Wohoo! Was looking forward to trying swimming in them. They didn't disappoint. The Thursday swim session was a killer. Loads of fly and IM. Main set kicked off with 12x25m of fly, of course it should have been 8x25m but the person leading didn't see it get revised down. Oh well. I was pretty dead by the end.
Friday brought another good day. After work run with some guys from work at lunch. Intervals on a section of The Common. A nice little corner with a 400m tarmac section then a 500m trail section back to the start. needless to say I tried to anhilate the intervals. Went out hard on the first one managing 1:38 for the 400m, a little easier on the second with a 1:41, a 1:37 next and they were starting to hurt, by the 4th Dave was starting to catch me at 200m and I was left to pace off him for a second 1:37, then a 1:38. I was seriously hurting on the last one, pushed myself to the limit and banged out a 1:36. Pretty chuffed with that. 5 intervals all within +/- 1s, and the whole lot with 5s. Consistency.
Of course not wanting to leave it there I went swimming in the evening, there was still and Endomondo challenge to have a go at, fastest 1000m done anyway, I chose 10x100m. Two hard interval sets in a day, bad idea? Well maybe not. Although I could still feel the run in my legs. scraped through the intervals on 01:29, 01:28, 01:31, 01:33, 01:33, 01:31, 01:33, 01:31, 01:35, 01:36. Again fairly consistent. They were hard efforts though no question, not having people to draft off made it brutal, not helped by my legs hurting still.
Saturday and it was bike time. BBC weather said the morning was going to be best, so up early, usual breakfast routine then got the bike ready for a 9:30 start. Major dilemas over what to wear. in the end I went for short bibs & top with long socks and arm warmers. Almost a good choice, the arm waremers were too warm. I'd lined up an extended route going out to the north east, up through Cheriton towards Arlesford then cutting back to the roads I am now getting to know around Bishop's Waltham. The weather of course didn't do what the beeb said it would. It was hot and sunny, gorgeous weather for spending outdoors on roads I pretty much had to myself for a lot of the time. Lovely ride and even the couple of bad driver incidents have blurred into oblivion.
Today was a repeat of one of my epic days from a month ago. Answering a call for crew I agreed to go sailing today, and frankly I would have been stupid not to with the weather. What I hadn't banked on was there only being 4 of us, and being the bowman as well as the #1 trimmer half the time. Well long story short, 4 hours on the water, 2 spent racing, couple of clusters but recovered well, a first and a second place in the 2 races. Got back to the bar and felt absolutely shagged. By the time I got home I have to say I was in no mood to go for a 20km run. Ironamn is not for quitters though and I had to MTFU and get out there, and I did. I was still a gorgeous afternoon so Camelbak loaded with water and energy foods I embarked on a trip around The Common and sports ground. Well it was actually not a bad run. Rather uneventful. Not exactly painless, but no injuries. I had a good go at choking myself at 14k when I decided to eat 2 shot bloks at once. D'oh. Then at 17k I sucked on the Camelbak and got nothing, I was out of water. Double D'oh. Also turns out the little 1k I added between 16-17 wasn't needed. My 20k run became 21k. Building a little fast, the original plan had today as 18k, but after going long last weekend I revised it. The hard day was good in the end, I think the sail primed me much like the bike leg would, little solid food and physically demnding work.
Well seems I've made it a long one again. Weekly roundup time, Swim 3 hours (7350m), Bike 4 hours 50m (83km + 1hr25m Turbo), Run 3 hours 19m (36km) for a total of 11 hours 10 minutes.
Mon - Rest
Tue pm - 1 hour swim (2650m)
Wed pm - 1hr25m turbo session
Wed pm - 30m brick run (6km)
Thur pm - 1 hour swim (2200m)
Fri pm - 52min run (9km)
Fri pm - 1 hour 2m swim (2500m)
Sat am - 3 hour 24m bike (83km)
Sun am - 4 hour sail (not fully logged, counting as 2 hours)
Sun pm - 1 hour 57m run (21km)
Next week is a tricky one. Will be away for work so the session depend on what the gym facilites are like. I know it has a 10m pool, pretty useless but might be good for tumble turn practice. Next weekend should be a 20km run and 90km bike. Might do a 22km run, and may even consider the 58 mile Ride It sportive in Woking on Sunday.
Showing posts with label Run. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Run. Show all posts
Sunday, 27 March 2011
Sunday, 6 March 2011
Not the week I had planned
As the title says, this week didn't exactly go according to the master plan. In trying to maintain the volume of last week a momentary lapse of concentration almost bought the week, and the near term goals to a crashing end.
Monday was my rest day, and was rather enjoyable really. The day at work seemed like nothing compared to Sunday's efforts. In an attempt to stay fit I did 20 minutes of stretches to loosen up in the evening. Using Christopher Norris' "Stretching for Runners" I worked through the stretches in part 1 and through some extra in at the end. All was going well until I tried Conehead's special hamstring stretch. Having stopped doing this for a while it reduced me to the point of tears. My hammys are pretty tight again. D'Oh.
Since I wasn't earlies I decided to fit a run in on Tuesday morning before work. Alarm goes off at 5am, out the door for 5:15 and off around the streets of Southampton. F*** me it hurt, my heart rate was stupidly high for such an abysmal pace. I eventually settled into 5:30ish km's, should be aiming for more 5:10ish really. After about 2.5k I had a lapse of concentration. Rounding a corner I didn't notice a kerb stone wasn't dropped as I landed on it, cue my left foot giving way slightly. Didn't really hurt so carried on. Turns out it should have hurt, only the pain came later. Yes I'd sprained my left ankle again. Thankfully it is only a very light sprain, barely a grade 1, probably just stretched the anterior talofibular ligament. Having happened a few times before it was on with the deep freeze spray and compression bandage. Standing up at work all day didn't help it, but it never really complained so Tuesday evening brought Masters. Another opportunity to assess the severity of it, after 50m I know it will be better for MK half on the 13th, but the rest of the swim would be just pull. The set wasn't too bad for pull in the end. The only stumbling block was the last 300m. 12 25's done as a swim to the deep end, out, and dive back in on a 1:00 for the next 25. Pull without a pull buoy isn't quite as fun.
Wednesday, well given the state of my flat the turbo was out, and there was no way I was running on my ankle, so an enforced rest day.
Thursday and back to Masters, did pull form the outset, no point risking my ankle. The only time I didn't was on the few breaststroke lengths, it is only really flutter kick that hurts it. Again another set that was suitable for pull. I was lucky. The end of the set bought some relay takeover practice. 25m efforts starting from the blocks that were set up, tumbling mid pool. My inability to dive hampered things here with some pathetic belly flop starts. So I got a bit of extra dive practice at the end. Taking James' push off advice I set about improving, completely soaking him in the process as my feeble belly flop turned into a far more powerful chest/belly flop. Oops.
Friday, well like Wednesday I decided this would be a rest day again. I probably could have run on my ankle, but it would have been screwed by Friday evening.
Saturday's planned 16K run was never going to be a good idea, so I opted to do Sunday's 60K ride, taking it a bit easier so I didn't have to climb out of the saddle on any hills. It was quite a pleasant ride. Followed the same route as last weekend, but came back into Southampton a more traffic friendly way. The weather was much nicer and the roads dry. Felt a bit of a cross wind at the top of the loop, but the sun was shining so everything was good. Managed to go slightly faster, for less perceived effort, with a higher average heart rate. I'm sure some of those are mutually exclusive, but it doesn't look like the Garmin is lying.
Today was an odd one, I had decided to go for a 70K ride after yesterday, but I kept rolling over in my sleep and causing pain in my ankle so decided against it. Instead I did housework. That horrible thing I have been neglecting. So I spent the morning, and a large part of the afternoon polishing, hoovering, cleaning glass, wiping floors. All done barefoot without my ankle support. This has convinced me my ankle will be good, no pain you see. The bonus of all this housework is there is space to set the turbo up once again. So having read all the post about sufferfest I thought I'd give it a go. Having looked through them Revolver looked like it my suit me, 15x1 minute intervals. Feck me it was hard. I've done spinervals, but they just make me sweat and give me tired legs. Trying to do these intervals was brutal. By the tenth interval I had a lump in my throat, by the twelfth I was praying I would make it through without making a bee line for the bathroom. Then I got to interval 15, I was so pleased when it was over. Except it wasn't. The helpful on screen prompt informed me the women still had a minute to go, and that if I wasn't "weak and pathetic" then I was doing one more. Cue the start and "You're not going to let these women spank you are you?" Well if your going to wave a red rag in my face... I was soooo glad when it was over. Have to say I really like sufferfest. It's nice watching the structured cycling clips, and the soundtrack is alright too. I've got "Local Hero" to try next. At around £7 each they are pretty good value too, far better than Spinervals.
You can see my pain and suffering here:
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/71602664
Weekly roundup, Swim 2 hours (4750m), Bike 60K + 47min Turbo, Run 8.4K for a total of 6hours 23 minutes.
Mon pm - 20 min Stretching+Flexibility
Tues pm - 1 hour swim (2250m)
Wed - Rest
Thur pm - 1 hour swim (2500m)
Fri - Rest
Sat am - 60km bike
Sun pm - 47 minute turbo
Next week is going to involve turbo sessions and swimming, might try an exploratory run on Wednesday before my half marathon on Sunday. The sub 1:40 goal has disappeared, finishing in one piece is now the goal.
Monday was my rest day, and was rather enjoyable really. The day at work seemed like nothing compared to Sunday's efforts. In an attempt to stay fit I did 20 minutes of stretches to loosen up in the evening. Using Christopher Norris' "Stretching for Runners" I worked through the stretches in part 1 and through some extra in at the end. All was going well until I tried Conehead's special hamstring stretch. Having stopped doing this for a while it reduced me to the point of tears. My hammys are pretty tight again. D'Oh.
Since I wasn't earlies I decided to fit a run in on Tuesday morning before work. Alarm goes off at 5am, out the door for 5:15 and off around the streets of Southampton. F*** me it hurt, my heart rate was stupidly high for such an abysmal pace. I eventually settled into 5:30ish km's, should be aiming for more 5:10ish really. After about 2.5k I had a lapse of concentration. Rounding a corner I didn't notice a kerb stone wasn't dropped as I landed on it, cue my left foot giving way slightly. Didn't really hurt so carried on. Turns out it should have hurt, only the pain came later. Yes I'd sprained my left ankle again. Thankfully it is only a very light sprain, barely a grade 1, probably just stretched the anterior talofibular ligament. Having happened a few times before it was on with the deep freeze spray and compression bandage. Standing up at work all day didn't help it, but it never really complained so Tuesday evening brought Masters. Another opportunity to assess the severity of it, after 50m I know it will be better for MK half on the 13th, but the rest of the swim would be just pull. The set wasn't too bad for pull in the end. The only stumbling block was the last 300m. 12 25's done as a swim to the deep end, out, and dive back in on a 1:00 for the next 25. Pull without a pull buoy isn't quite as fun.
Wednesday, well given the state of my flat the turbo was out, and there was no way I was running on my ankle, so an enforced rest day.
Thursday and back to Masters, did pull form the outset, no point risking my ankle. The only time I didn't was on the few breaststroke lengths, it is only really flutter kick that hurts it. Again another set that was suitable for pull. I was lucky. The end of the set bought some relay takeover practice. 25m efforts starting from the blocks that were set up, tumbling mid pool. My inability to dive hampered things here with some pathetic belly flop starts. So I got a bit of extra dive practice at the end. Taking James' push off advice I set about improving, completely soaking him in the process as my feeble belly flop turned into a far more powerful chest/belly flop. Oops.
Friday, well like Wednesday I decided this would be a rest day again. I probably could have run on my ankle, but it would have been screwed by Friday evening.
Saturday's planned 16K run was never going to be a good idea, so I opted to do Sunday's 60K ride, taking it a bit easier so I didn't have to climb out of the saddle on any hills. It was quite a pleasant ride. Followed the same route as last weekend, but came back into Southampton a more traffic friendly way. The weather was much nicer and the roads dry. Felt a bit of a cross wind at the top of the loop, but the sun was shining so everything was good. Managed to go slightly faster, for less perceived effort, with a higher average heart rate. I'm sure some of those are mutually exclusive, but it doesn't look like the Garmin is lying.
Today was an odd one, I had decided to go for a 70K ride after yesterday, but I kept rolling over in my sleep and causing pain in my ankle so decided against it. Instead I did housework. That horrible thing I have been neglecting. So I spent the morning, and a large part of the afternoon polishing, hoovering, cleaning glass, wiping floors. All done barefoot without my ankle support. This has convinced me my ankle will be good, no pain you see. The bonus of all this housework is there is space to set the turbo up once again. So having read all the post about sufferfest I thought I'd give it a go. Having looked through them Revolver looked like it my suit me, 15x1 minute intervals. Feck me it was hard. I've done spinervals, but they just make me sweat and give me tired legs. Trying to do these intervals was brutal. By the tenth interval I had a lump in my throat, by the twelfth I was praying I would make it through without making a bee line for the bathroom. Then I got to interval 15, I was so pleased when it was over. Except it wasn't. The helpful on screen prompt informed me the women still had a minute to go, and that if I wasn't "weak and pathetic" then I was doing one more. Cue the start and "You're not going to let these women spank you are you?" Well if your going to wave a red rag in my face... I was soooo glad when it was over. Have to say I really like sufferfest. It's nice watching the structured cycling clips, and the soundtrack is alright too. I've got "Local Hero" to try next. At around £7 each they are pretty good value too, far better than Spinervals.
You can see my pain and suffering here:
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/71602664
Weekly roundup, Swim 2 hours (4750m), Bike 60K + 47min Turbo, Run 8.4K for a total of 6hours 23 minutes.
Mon pm - 20 min Stretching+Flexibility
Tues pm - 1 hour swim (2250m)
Wed - Rest
Thur pm - 1 hour swim (2500m)
Fri - Rest
Sat am - 60km bike
Sun pm - 47 minute turbo
Next week is going to involve turbo sessions and swimming, might try an exploratory run on Wednesday before my half marathon on Sunday. The sub 1:40 goal has disappeared, finishing in one piece is now the goal.
Saturday, 26 February 2011
A busy start to the weekend
So I've managed to cram plenty in to the past few days. I managed a swim, run, and decent bike in the past 48 hours and the weekends not over yet.
Thursdays swim went much better than Tuesdays. The use of and energy drink certainly kept things moving. It was a pretty hard set in fact. The warm up included the requisite amount of IM to make it brutal. 6x75m of IM drill/swim with no crawl. The kick in the teeth came next, 2x200m of IM done as 100s, except the time we went of meant it was more like 4x100m IM with no rest. To make things even better then we moved on to lots and lots of pull. My shoulders we ready to fall off by the end.
Friday bought the runners club at work, the slower runner had a cold so I had a feeling it might be a hard run. Time wise it wasn't too bad, but with the faster guy I normally pace off going easy for a half marathon he's got this weekend I was holding back a bit. Still, the pace I managed might have been a bit too much for the coach, he had to walk /slow jog the last mile as his calf gave out. Oops. That drew the 'is the pace of these runs too slow for you' question at the end. Thing is, the pace was what is normally just right for me and it might have felt a little slow.
This morning I did my usual checks, resting heart rate is up to 46 and BP is a little higher than normal. Guess this means I'm getting a bit overtrained. Oh well, Monday can be a rest day. Today was a 'long' bike. Long in this sense meant 60k, not really that long, but tough enough given last weekends attempt. My usual route of this length was a bit crap last weekend, too much traffic. So I decided to plan a route in 'hills' to the east of Winchester. The weather was looking rather good as I got ready. Of course when I walked out the door the clouds came over. It was actually quite a good ride, I had no power on the hills but my legs weren't rebelling so that was a bonus. About halfway in I got a little drizzle but then the sun came back and the ride finished quite nicely. My plan to cross the top of Southampton on the way home almost back fired. Having had a rather uneventful ride one driver had his go a killing me. Why the hell he felt the need to look back at me then pull in hard to the curb is beyond me. I stopped soon enough to stay out of danger, but reminded me how much I hate trying to filter through traffic.
Once home I had a go at cramming as much as possible into the afternoon. After a quick lunch, hair cut and shower it was off to Tesco to buy some food for dinner. Got back with just enough time to spend 30 minutes getting my bike cleaned up, start cooking dinner and then sit down to watch the England match. I'm now filled up with one of my excellent chillies, with a couple of portions for after training tomorrow and on Monday night. Tomorrow could be an interesting day. I shall be attempting a jam packed morning of sailing combined with 20K run when I get back from it. Hopefully it will all go well. I'll let you know tomorrow.
Thursdays swim went much better than Tuesdays. The use of and energy drink certainly kept things moving. It was a pretty hard set in fact. The warm up included the requisite amount of IM to make it brutal. 6x75m of IM drill/swim with no crawl. The kick in the teeth came next, 2x200m of IM done as 100s, except the time we went of meant it was more like 4x100m IM with no rest. To make things even better then we moved on to lots and lots of pull. My shoulders we ready to fall off by the end.
Friday bought the runners club at work, the slower runner had a cold so I had a feeling it might be a hard run. Time wise it wasn't too bad, but with the faster guy I normally pace off going easy for a half marathon he's got this weekend I was holding back a bit. Still, the pace I managed might have been a bit too much for the coach, he had to walk /slow jog the last mile as his calf gave out. Oops. That drew the 'is the pace of these runs too slow for you' question at the end. Thing is, the pace was what is normally just right for me and it might have felt a little slow.
This morning I did my usual checks, resting heart rate is up to 46 and BP is a little higher than normal. Guess this means I'm getting a bit overtrained. Oh well, Monday can be a rest day. Today was a 'long' bike. Long in this sense meant 60k, not really that long, but tough enough given last weekends attempt. My usual route of this length was a bit crap last weekend, too much traffic. So I decided to plan a route in 'hills' to the east of Winchester. The weather was looking rather good as I got ready. Of course when I walked out the door the clouds came over. It was actually quite a good ride, I had no power on the hills but my legs weren't rebelling so that was a bonus. About halfway in I got a little drizzle but then the sun came back and the ride finished quite nicely. My plan to cross the top of Southampton on the way home almost back fired. Having had a rather uneventful ride one driver had his go a killing me. Why the hell he felt the need to look back at me then pull in hard to the curb is beyond me. I stopped soon enough to stay out of danger, but reminded me how much I hate trying to filter through traffic.
Once home I had a go at cramming as much as possible into the afternoon. After a quick lunch, hair cut and shower it was off to Tesco to buy some food for dinner. Got back with just enough time to spend 30 minutes getting my bike cleaned up, start cooking dinner and then sit down to watch the England match. I'm now filled up with one of my excellent chillies, with a couple of portions for after training tomorrow and on Monday night. Tomorrow could be an interesting day. I shall be attempting a jam packed morning of sailing combined with 20K run when I get back from it. Hopefully it will all go well. I'll let you know tomorrow.
Tuesday, 18 May 2010
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