from Diary of a Rubbish Marathon Runner Maybe I should not call this the hill phase, as I’m only doing one hill workout a week. I might do 2 next week, but haven’t decided yet. That’s not to say that I’m taking it easy. Far from it. I’m far more tired than I was during my 85+ mile weeks. Running fast is exhausting, who would have thought! Wednesday I headed for the hills again, in what was basically a repeat of last week’s workout. The first things I noted as soon as I left the house were the tired legs. I wondered if there was any point in even attempting that workout. I could have run easily again and done the hills on Thursday. However, if I get up in time for a longer workout but only end up running, say, 8 miles, I would have sacrificed half an hour of sleep for nothing. It’s probably not a very good reason for persevering with the original plan, but it was good enough for me.
The tempo part of the run wasn’t very good, there’s no denying. I ran 2.65 miles at an average pace of 6:47, 6 seconds per mile slower than last week, and if I had not kicked in for the last quarter mile the figures would have been even worse. The legs just were not cooperating. I tried to convince myself that the effort is more important than the pace, and that I might still get the same benefits out of the hill sprints. Well, I did the same all-out efforts up the same segment of hill. Of course, we humans only ever do true all-out efforts if a sabre toothed tiger or one of its relatives is chasing us, and when doing a simple training run then you always find you can push some more, no matter how hard you’re already trying. I did notice that the max HR at the top was 2-3 beats lower than last week, but I cannot say for sure if I ran less hard or if it was the result of my body already adapting to that sort of training. The positive thing was that I managed 9 repeats compared to 7 last week, but next time I will definitely try to extend the hill sprints to 60 seconds, even though I generally feel like collapsing after 45 seconds. As I said, I’ll try.
Thursday was an easy day, slightly hampered by the awful conditions. The wind and rain was enough to make me do 2 out-and-back runs to Ard-na-Sidhe rather than run alongside Caragh Lake. The legs, especially the quads, felt very stiff and heavy. Once again I was glad to be back home 81 minutes after leaving. I wonder how I managed to go out for a second loop, because the temptation to call it quits halfway through was definitely there. Maybe it was the urge not to have sacrificed sleep needlessly again.
Last Friday I had done a marathon effort workout and I decided to repeat that today, but to extend the fast section. I warmed up for the first 1.5 miles, then ran 8.5 miles at marathon effort, with half a mile to cool down at the end. I felt very good initially, but that was when the wind was at my back. To nobody’s surprise the second half was a lot tougher, and my average pace didn’t hold up. I was a bit annoyed with myself because I kept losing focus and slowed down to 7:30 on more than one occasion. The HR was supposed to be in the low 160s, but the average ended up just below 160. Still, it was 5 seconds per mile faster than last week, which is not a bad improvement at all. I take that, and I know there is more where that came from.
28 Jan
10.5 milesm 1:27:11, 8:18 pace, HR 147
incl. 2.65 miles @ 6:47, 9x45sec hill sprints
29 Jan
10 miles, 1:21:01, 8:06 pace, HR 142
30 Jan
10.5 miles, 1:16:20, 7:16 pace, HR 155
incl. 8.5 miles @ 7:03 (159 HR)