11km with 2 x 15min Tempo efforts

After a couple of days off I was keen to get out into the crisp morning air today.

Following a 2km warm up I wound myself up for the first of two 15 minute efforts with a 6 minute recovery. There was one section that was just the perfect degree of downhill for the almost a kilometre. I felt like I was absolutely flying down it wondering how people maintain this speed for a half or full marathon even over the flat and uphill sections. It felt great, but later on I wasn’t so speedy as I made my way back up the slope!!

I worked my way over to Peakhurst, past Hurstville Golf Course (not actually located in Hurstville itself) and through Oatley today. It was an hour all up, and felt like I was coasting a bit more than I should have, particularly during the 2nd effort. The time seemed to pass fairly swiftly, and I was soon back home before the sun made its way into the sky.

As I walked the final few hundred metres to cool down I saw an older guy working his way from house to house taking everyone’s local paper from their front lawn and putting it on their front doorstep…how odd, but what a nice neighbour to have!!

Yes, I’m in Sydney again…just a quick trip this time, and it’s why I worked myself to being slightly ahead of schedule on my training program to allow for a few missed days this week due to travelling and other interruptions.

As if I don't have enough work to do I've just sat here precisely plotting my run in Google Earth...but like Jodie says, I'm a silly, silly man sometimes! :oD It’s just a novelty to have the finer detail on the Sydney maps when Port is relatively coarse and doesn't get down to street level detail. It’s not for nothing though as now I know the distance for an unfamiliar course and can post the image. I really rounded the distance nicely on the route too. Special!

9km with 4 x 1000m Intervals

I ran the old Settlement Point return trip this morning after a bit of a later start. Threw in some doubling back during my 2:30min recoveries so that I’d start and finish on the km markers. I completed the 4km worth of Vo2 efforts with an average of 4:24 pace, which is pretty much spot on what I was aiming for based on the McMillan Running pace chart.

There were quite a few runners and cyclists out this morning…probably because I was running a bit later than usual. But I was feeling somewhat less than sociable for some reason, so just stuck to a few quick nods or a wave. It was just a little harder work this morning. I just kept my head down and slugged it out. Probably just a bit flat in recovering from Friday’s long run...I can feel an early night coming on!!

Miners was planning to head out for a long run down south along a trail that Go Girl and WTR pioneered towards Lake Cathie, but I thought better of backing up with another long run myself! It’s now only two weeks until the Half!

20km Aerobic

Today was the last of the longer aerobic runs with 2 weeks to go until the Half.

Set off in the pre dawn darkness with the fuel belt loaded up. Today was run in a figure 8 pattern, passing home at about 70 minutes. I started down the length of Pacific Drive so I could take in the sunrise, heading all the way to the breakwall. As nice as a perfectly clear sky is, it’s more spectacular to have some cloud on the horizon to bring out the colours from the sun. Anyway, after a short trip along the river I headed back to the start mostly via Granite Street, which made a nice change as I don’t usually travel the full length of it.

I left some water and Gatorade on the front step, so after a quick refuel I headed out to the Lighthouse where I popped a Raspberry Hammer Gel. This had a similar consistency to the GU I tried, and tasted pretty good. But I think I prefer the likes of the PB and High 5 gels, which are easier to get down and require less water. Of course the trade off is obviously the thicker gels aren’t as running so they seem to reduce any mess/stickiness.

Then it was down along Lighthouse Beach and a loop out past the Tacking Point Tavern. I saved a solid climb for the final part of the run and felt that I ran it strongly. I didn’t need any persuasion to opt out of the gruelling climb to the top of Transit Hill, and settled instead for a solid finish up to the top of Astronomers Terrace, which brought up 1 hour and 52 minutes. Then it was just a short walk home followed by some relaxing stretches.

Overall I felt good at the end of it all. In fact the little niggles from last week seem to have cleared right up. I was happy with the variety on the run as well – certainly not a flat course for the most part today.

And just for a change, there was no weather whatsoever in Port Macquarie this morning :P

Bloglines feed

I've noticed over the last week or so that when I publish a new post Bloglines seems to be picking up random posts that I haven't edited for weeks as though they have just been edited. No doubt it's an issue on the Blogger side of things. I haven't noticed it from anyone else's blog.

Has anyone else had this issue or know how I can stop it happening?

Sorry to anyone using bloglines or another aggregator that's getting blasted with old posts - I don't edit old posts so don't bother trying to find the edits! :(

(No doubt there are a couple more coming your way with this post!!) :P

Sub Zero Temperatures

No running today, just an update on that overnight temperature from yesterday.

The forecast had been for 4 degrees, but it turns out that we got a sub zero low overnight! On the news I heard -2, but the Bureau of Meteorology quotes -1.

Either way that's damn cold for around here...cold for Miners on the bike and cold for me and my fingers running!!

10km with 2 x 12 min Tempo efforts

On hearing the overnight low would be 4 degrees last night I knew it was going to be a tough start this morning with the sun just below the horizon! Thoughts of fellow bloggers in chillier climates saying “bah, you call that cold” got me through it though. Just took a while for the fingers to warm into it.

It was a spectacular morning, so well worth the effort. As the sun rose there was a nice orangey hue all along the horizon. I was at a high point along Kennedy Drive at the time and could see the rolling country hills on one side and the ocean on the other - a nice commanding view!

For the first effort I weaved my way through some of the hills around the back of Flynns Beach. After a 5 minute downhill recovery along Swift St I headed south on Pacific Drive and up Shelly Beach Rd, taking a couple of offroad diversions to add some extra rise and fall as I was feeling like a challenge today.

Overall I got what I was looking for from today’s run, which was a good mix of longer climbs and shorter sharper hills…very little flat at all.

8km with 5 x 600m Intervals

In between a 2km warm up and 2km cool down I fitted today’s 5 x 600m VO2 intervals with 90 second jog recovery out along the Settlement Point return course.

Against the run of previous experience I didn’t spot any large groups of cyclists today - just the odd runner and cyclist here and there...today must have been a morning off for a lot of people!

I woke up on Sunday with no pain or discomfort anywhere at all. The legs felt good before and after today’s run, confirming for me that at least for the next few weeks I’ll avoid running on consecutive days. The day off seems to be beneficial and I think I’ll get the most out of the sessions that way. I’ve mapped out the next 3 weeks so that I don’t need to double up at all, with room for a ride here and there.

19km Aerobic Run

Today was scheduled as a 1 hr 40 min easy run. I’d planned a 17km route down Koala St, through the industrial area to the Oxley Hwy, past the racecourse and through Clifton to Settlement City, Then along the river past Westport Park and Town Beach, before heading back home along the beaches on Pacific Drive. 6 minute k’s would have seen me through nicely. I passed through the 5km mark in 27 minutes, 10km in 51 minutes, and hit the 17km mark in around 90 minutes. So I threw in a couple of extra km to make up just over the 100 minutes planned.

Coming towards the 17km point I was climbing up Pacific Drive from Shelly Beach to Lighthouse Rd, and the hill takes a slightly sharper rise near the top. As I started to slow down I felt the urge to push through, and came out with a surprising burst of power on the steepest part of the hill for about 20 or 30 seconds. It actually felt really good and didn’t seem to drain me at all. Looks like those hill reps are paying off :) I’ll have to keep then in mind for the future, say when I get another crack at the City to Surf or something like that.

I was travelling fairly comfortably at today’s pace, with the feeling that I could have pushed harder for most of the way, and although I did ease back on a few of the hills I found that I made up for it with some strong efforts down the other side. Based purely on this run, I think that 1hr 45min is a realistic goal for the Half. I was only a couple of km short of the distance, and by the time I hit 19km I had a few minutes up my sleeve as I finished before 105min so that would leave me with not much more than a kilometre to make up on the day.

I had some calf tightness (actually on the inside of the leg and right behind the shin) over the last day or so, which I could feel as I started off this morning. By the time I’d warmed up it had gone, and now 6 hours after the run I still can’t “find” it. I was a bit concerned that it might turn into something, but it seems the long run must have done it some good!
The only pain that came out of today is a bit of soreness just back from the second toe on my left foot. Sort of like a callous on the fleshy part of the skin to the left of the ball of the foot. Maybe I pulled the sock on too tight and my toe was a bit cramped or something. I can't blame the new shoes as I was in the old ones today. It’s a bit awkward to walk on but is better now than a few hours ago so I hope it sorts itself out before my next run on Monday!

9km with Tempo + 4 x 90sec Hill Reps

This is more like it!

Following a 3km warm up I launched into the 12 minute tempo effort that was hilly for most parts through McLaren Drv, Granite St, Braemar Drv and Waniora Pkwy to meet up with Mimosa Drive, which was today’s feature hill.

It was closer to 13 minutes by the bottom of the hill, at which point the first rep was really tough. Turns out this hill was spot on 90 seconds, and I turned back just short of the top on all but the last rep when I just made it to the very top. There are a couple of steeper hills around, but this one is a good length and sucks you in with a relatively gentle start. The incline seems to continually increase all the way to the top so you really have to step up the effort to keep the strides strong as you reach the top. It’s such a relief to pivot and let the slope drag you back down!!

Feeling great now after a really solid session. I think I'm addicted to my training program.
Hi, my name's Paul and I'm hooked on 12 week training programs...less than 48 hours to my next fix :o)

I was just calculating how many k’s I’ve covered this month and projecting what’s on the program for the rest of the May. Based on my build up so far this year I was hoping to cover about 150-160 km for May. With 99km in the bank already, at this point it’s looking to be around 170km, and that’s even with recovery runs converted to days off! So in a concerted effort to build up slowly and keep any overuse symptoms from popping up I’ll have to finally dust off the bike and do a couple of easy rides as recovery run substitutes.

Tuesday 5km

Just a leisurely half hour recovery run around the Waniora area this morning.

Even though this was such a nice easy run, there was a slight mental difficulty to deal with. After the level of effort involved over the last couple of runs I felt like I was really slacking off today. As I was kicking along thoughts popped into my head about how I could get too used to this, and the temptation to lift the intensity increased. But the program said "Recovery" so recovery it was! Unfortunately I left it at home, but these are the sort of runs whether I’ve always found the heart rate monitor particularly useful to help make sure I keep it relaxed.

Monday 8km with 6x400m Intervals

There was some light rain this morning, but in the time it took me to duck back inside for a cap the rain had stopped.

This is a lighter recovery week, and Monday was to be some more “VO2” intervals with 90 second jog recoveries. I headed down to the Lighthouse Beach stretch rather than the playing fields as they’d probably be a bit slushy. With 6 intervals to do I needed a bit of doubling back to make it all fit into the flat sections.

There was what looked like a 20-30 strong boot camp group jogging back to the surf club as I went past. I suspect they had just been forced into tackling the MFD hill for their punishment!!

The legs felt a little stiff at first from the long Saturday run. I really should have thought to do some stretching on Sunday.

Saturday 26 Km

I met up with Miners, Riggo and Col at Town Beach car park and headed out on the first of the three legs that made up today’s run.

The first leg was just over 8km in just over 40 minutes, which was a little faster than I had planned over a hilly course. The again, what else would I expect when going for a run with 2 Ironmen and a speed demon!! We did a loop down to Shelly Beach, but by the climb up from Flynns Beach on the way back I hit the anchors and let them get away as I was a little concerned for the back end of the run!

The rest of the group was just about ready to go by then, so I belted up and headed off for the second 50 minute leg. This was a lap around Kooloonbung Creek then over for a lap of Westport Park and back to Town Beach. This time I ran with Leigh at a more relaxed conversational pace…actually it was still a bit quicker than planned, but the mostly flat terrain reduced the degree of difficulty considerably.

After dropping her back at Town Beach and a quick refuel I headed back out for my final 50 minute leg. On the way out I passed most of the others on their way back, and doubled back for a brief chat with Miners before he got sidetracked with his GPS treasure hunt! For some reason I thought I had 25 minutes to go at that stage but on recalculation it was pretty much double that. After having the conversational distractions for the first hour and a half combined with the earlier pace I really had to push myself through the last leg solo. I was surprised to note that I was still travelling at a decent pace on auto pilot. I headed back along the river to Westport Park before forcing myself to grind out some hills over to Flynns Beach and back to Town Beach. Cooled down with a 10 minute walk and 15 minutes of stretching…and I really needed it by then!!

Jorex was asking about the fuel belt, so here are some notes. I only wore it for the 2nd and 3rd legs. I’d used plenty of bodyglide in preparation for it on Tesso and Go Girl’s recommendation. I was very conscious of it for the first 5-10 minutes, but soon forgot about it. It was very convenient, and didn’t leave the area sore at all even after more than an hour and a half for a first try. It’s firmly elastic, so I set it with a little tension around the hips and it didn’t move at all. The pocket on the back is handy as well for keys, gels, etc.. The four bottles take roughly 750ml all up and I believe you can buy more to attach. I’m really glad I have it now and it will certainly add some flexibility to these longer runs.

At the end of the second leg I tried a pb sports lemon-lime gel, which went down well. I also refilled a couple of the fuel belt bottles at that point to get me through to the end.

By the time I got back, cooled down and stretched I was well behind everyone else so skipped breakfast…found out we had visitors coming anyway so headed straight back home with the whole weekend ahead to recover! Posting this Sunday night…It’s been a busy weekend…even missed the PM Ironman highlights amongst it all :’( I pulled up great today, and I’m looking forward to my run tomorrow so time to pack up for the day. Hope to catch up on some blog reading in the next couple of days!

7km with Tempo + 3 x 90sec Hill Reps

Isabel is sleeping so well of late, but she had some trouble settling around 5am this morning so I sat in her room in the comfy chair beside her cot listening to rain and dozing as she drifted back off to sleep. By the time it was light and she woke up again the rain had eased off so I made up her bottle, handed her over and set out for a run.

The rain held off for a further 15 minutes until I’d finished my warm up before settling into a light drizzle. I then commenced a 6 minute effort before going straight into 3 x 90 second hill reps part way up Parsons Ridge Rd. This hill didn’t pull up short like the one last week, and the incline gradually increased the higher I went. With the reps out of the way I trundled around Timber Ridge and the back of Lighthouse in the drizzle for a bit before packing it in for a warm shower.

I picked up a fuel belt from http://www.trscyclecentre.com.au the other day. Now to test it out on the Saturday long run! After hearing so much about expensive bikes over the last year of so, the problem I have now is walking past all those shiny bikes and thinking “hmmm that one isn’t as expensive as I thought”. The temptation has passed for now, but it’s certainly in my mind for down the track. For now there’s enough to buy with the new baby coming along soon. And no, I’m going to be more responsible than spend the baby bonus on a new bike for me!!

6km Recovery

A beautiful morning for an easy, relaxed run around to Tacking Point Tavern and along Lighthouse Beach in my new shoes.

After my last couple of posts in particular I feel the need to keep it short but sweet, so I will.

Nice.

9km incl 4x800m Intervals

This was a similar V02 session to last Sunday, but an extra 200 metres each. I left the new shoes at home as their first run isn’t going to be on the wet grass down at the Mackillop playing fields.

I completed the first two about 10-15 seconds quicker than the second two, but again it was the final effort that I was most comfortable with. It’s probably because until I reach the last interval it plays on my mind that there are more to come so I don’t relax as much as I do right at the end. I think once I get used to the sessions I’ll be able to relax through them all a bit more.

I need to go down and measure the “track” sometime. I run around two playing fields, so whilst I’m fairly comfortable that their length is around 100m, I’m really only guessing about the width of the fields, including the gap between them. I suspect I may have run longer than 800m for each interval.

Well would you believe it, word has obviously spread. This morning I actually started off with an audience of 2…that’s double the attendance at last week’s session. They were a couple of workers who obviously hadn’t started work yet, so they were standing up on the hill watching me run!!! In reality they were probably watching the heavy machinery work going on behind me where it looks like they’re creating a couple more playing fields, but the illusion was that they were watching me. By the time I was into my second effort another ute turned up and the spectators doubled again to 4. ;o) And this time it was actually a sober audience (as far as I could tell).

As far as spectators go, they've got nothing on the CR cheersquad though!! :)

As I headed past them on the way home they commented that I’d have a much larger area to run around soon enough. Now that would completely stuff up my measurements!

10km Striders North Head

45:53…a PB by just over two and a half minutes :)

Had a good night on Friday involving an Italian meal in The Rocks with a great bunch of CRs. Ended up home much later than expected, but well worth the lack of sleep for a fantastic night…My thanks to Lulu for the invite and for organising it :)

And so armed with 4 hours sleep I was surprisingly alert as I packed my bags to head straight back to Port after the race. I arrived nice and early, allowing plenty of time to meet up with some of the dinner crew from last night as well as a multitude of CRs, many of whom I was meeting for the first time. Only Lulu, Wine Trail Runner (who were out at Holsworthy instead), and The Owl (other plans for the day, ahem) weren’t backing up at North Head in some capacity!!

It really was a sensational morning for running…nothing but blue sky and a nice crisp morning. I did an easy 5 minute warm up with a couple of surges towards the end before getting back to the start with a couple of minutes to spare.

As the pace chart below shows, I started on 45 minute pace, which was not hard being pulled along by the crowd in the beginning. I think that I ran pretty much as I planned simply by pacing myself as unfortunately Horrie, the planned 45 minute pacer couldn’t make it at the last minute. So it was good experience to go it alone anyway. I was fairly comfortable for the first 6km. By that I mean that I was definitely working, but I had my breathing under control and was able to have the odd quick chat to other runners, so I was happy that I wasn’t going too hard and risking blowing out near the end.

The 7th, 8th and 9th kms were more of a struggle, and as the pace shows I was slowing down but felt like I was working harder. But I was still holding a little back, and by the final km I knew I was fine to finish so I really dug deep and lifted, throwing it all in for the final run. It didn’t hurt that the final section is downhill, and it showed in the 30 second difference between the 9th and 10th km, to finish with my fastest km of the run!!

I’d have to say that with all I’d heard about North Head being a fast course and mostly flat, it wasn’t as flat as I expected. Certainly no serious hills to contend with, but when I think flat I think about the 8km Settlement Point return here in Port. My memory is blurred by the effort and I’d have to run it again to reassess, but I thought that the Homebush course seemed to have more level sections. I know it’s hard to argue with a 2 and a half minute faster run, but I’d put most of that down to much more structured training in the last couple of months than anything else. The view out near the turnaround is absolutely stunning…lucky I had a good look the first time out there because I wasn’t in a state for sightseeing on the second (final) lap!

The support on the course was great, particularly Go Girl, Jen_Runs and Tesso cheering near the start/turnaround/finish area and Rooster at the roundabout, so there were those regular boosts along the way! Thanks so much to them for the support, and the other odd “Go Cool Runner” along the way.

I missed a couple of km markers, so averaged the 2/3 and 5/6 kms. I missed hitting both the start and the finish on time, so my watch time is slight off official time, but only by a few seconds.

In any case it blew my first 10km race on the Striders Homebush course last year out of the water, which for the record was 48:30.

1 - 4.31
2 - 4.25
3 - 4.25
4 - 4.32
5 - 4.37
6 - 4.37
7 - 4.50
8 - 4.38
9 - 4.49
10 - 4.24

After the race there were plenty more CRs to meet and quite a few PBs were to hear about. Then there was a quick hop to Manly for a leisurely breakfast. Mmmm, breakfast.

After breakfast I dropped into Northside Runners to have a look at some new shoes. I had in mind to get a pair of Asics Nimbus to see how they felt. After the guys in the store had a look at my stride and the wear on my current pair of shoes after about 600km they recommended that the Asics GT 2110’s that I have now are actually most suited to me. I tried a couple of similar shoes in other brands, but still preferred the feel of the 2110’s. So it turns out I stumbled on the best shoes for me by accident! It made me recall when I first got them and was surprised to note that I barely knew I was wearing them as they were so comfortable. So I grabbed another pair to start wearing in. I’d have to say that the guys at Northside were really knowledgeable and I had a good chat to them. Was really nice to see them selling me what suits me rather than just giving me the shoes that I asked about initially which was the more expensive model!! Also grabbed a few different gels to continue testing.

With that I headed off for a late afternoon arrival home. I really enjoyed the last couple of days. It was most enjoyable to chat with everyone, and hope to have further opportunities to do so when I’m in Sydney in the near future.

6km Recovery

A nice easy 6km run today at just under 6min/km pace as a recovery and to keep the legs moving in preparation for the Striders run tomorrow.

I find it hard to judge how I’ll go on the day. I don’t think I’ll be breaking the 45min mark for the 10km and will be happy finishing somewhere between 45 and 50 minutes. I think I need to focus on losing a few more kilos combined with a little more speed work after the Half Marathon to lift my pace a bit. Then I can think about at having a serious crack at a couple of 10k’s!

It will just be good to do my first run on what sounds like a fantastic course, and will be great meet up with some CR’s both tonight and in the morning :)

7km with Hill Reps

Today was an 8 minute tempo effort followed immediately with 4 x 90 second hill/strength intervals with a jog down as recovery. These should be run by not reducing stride length (by much) for the hill. This was my first specific hill/strength session.

My route worked out perfectly so I was at the bottom of the hill as the 8 minutes expired, but the only problem was that I’d only chosen an 80 second hill!! By the time I found this out it was too late to swap hills so I just pretended I was still going up hill and just pushed a bit harder as it flattened out. Of course upping the effort on the hill itself is useless as that only turns it into a 75 second hill!! It was still a good workout though.

Oh well, at least when I get back home to Port I’ve got plenty of two, three and four minute plus hills of varying slope just around the corner from home so I won’t be caught short again in the coming weeks :)

I didn’t have to rush off this morning either as I had a meeting with a customer closer to “home” than usual. But that has left me with a busy afternoon and precious little internet time today…still a brief window to blog, but I can feel the withdrawal symptoms already!!

6km Easy

It’s becoming rare that I have two days break in a row lately. But a 4.30am start on Monday to drive to Sydney then work all day saw me enjoying my Tuesday sleep in! Plus I am ahead of schedule which only leaves me with one official session to do for the whole week, leaving me at a bit of a loose end.

So today was just a relaxing run for fun, and comprised a pre dawn loop through Penshurst, Mortdale and Oatley to finish back at Hurstville Grove in just over half an hour.

I haven’t run this route since January, so my improvement is really noticeable. After a rough 5-10 minutes getting warmed up I settled into an easy pace. I’m finding that I’m feeling my strongest after about 4-5km now so I’m really encouraged about the program I’m following.

It felt like I pulled up short at 6km, but resisted the temptation to continue as today is the first of 4 days straight, culminating in the Striders 10km at North Head on Saturday. I’m so excited to finally be able to make another Striders run as it can be difficult coordinating them with my trips to Sydney. Admittedly it will only be my second, but will be my first since receiving my CR cap!