Week 15 of 18

Monday 7km Recovery Run
Made my way along Pacific Drive to Flynns Beach then home via some of the back streets.


Tuesday 13.5km Tempo Run
Followed the same route last last week. This time I did 3 x 12 minute efforts with 4 minute recoveries. They were a bit quicker than last week, which is encouraging, but was consequently a bit tougher. Made it home around dawn, had a bite to eat and a shower before ducking into town to catch up with Miners for a coffee before work…was good to have a chat – last chance before Ironman weekend.

I was a little sore at the base of my left hamstring, and had a dull ache in the left heel signalling some Achilles tightness. I’ve been stretching fairly well, but gave the trouble spots 2 solid days of rest, ice and elevation before my Thursday run.


Thursday 10km VO2 Intervals
Back down to Wayne Richards Park for some more intervals. This time it was to be 4 x 1km with 2 minute jog recoveries.
Given that I could still feel the hamstring and Achilles when I got up I was prepared to pull the plug on this session at any stage rather than risk aggravating anything. Both spots were a bit tender at the start, but I warmed up really slowly, had a stretch when I got to the park and got stuck into the intervals.
The first 1km interval was just over 5 minutes, as I wanted to test things out and didn’t want to go too hard from the start. With everything working fine I then did 4:20 to 4:30 for the next couple, and the final km was just over 4 minutes.
There was some very minor pain by the time I cooled down, but much better than after Tuesday’s run, so I’ll just keep up the treatment and hope to keep them under control.


Saturday 36km Long Run
I wanted a mostly flat run today so I drove in and parked by the Fish Co-op and planned 3 out and back loops from the car.
The first 13km loop was over to Windmill Hill, Town Beach then out to Settlement Point and back. There was a big tent city set up by Bicycle NSW at Oxley Oval.
The second loop was out to the Airport. Saw a RAAF jet takeoff as I went past, almost copping its jet wash as I ran behind it just before take off. Nice rate of climb.
The final loop was around Gordon Street, Westport High and a final run out to Settlement Point and back.
I finished in 3:35 which is a bit quicker than my previous 36km run, but also using one less gel and feeling better at the end. I did have a couple of minor concerns with my hamstring and hip. The hip was sore after my last 36km run but responded well to massage and hadn’t troubled me again until this run. I noticed that it only really got sore when running when the road was sloping to the right so I spent as much time as possible on the left side of the road.
I was struggling at a couple of stages over the last 10km so it was a good chance to practice some mental toughness, assisted by remembering some encouraging comments from the blog that helped push me along. I also focussed on keeping my head up and looking around, as opposed to last time where my head went down and my focus shifted inwards. I think by looking around it helped take my mind off the effort. I did succumb to a moment of weakness when I walked for a hundred metres or so, but I got over that and for good measure threw in a sub 5:30 minute kilometre to finish up.
I wandered to the Town Green to stretch by the river in the shade before heading over to Flynns Beach for a brisk ocean swim to sooth the legs.




For some reason I felt a bit lethargic last Monday after the run…tired and lacking motivation. It was mildly better by Tuesday, although the onset of the couple of leg pains made me a little concerned through Wednesday. By the end of the run on Thursday I was feeling good again, confident that I could manage the legs and looking forward to the long run on the weekend.
The last couple of days since the long run were a bit sore in the hip, hamstring and just a very mild ache in the heel on getting up in the morning. I had a massage tonight (Monday) focussing on those spots and I hope it improves the situation. I think the hamstring is my main concern as it’s a new occurance, although it’s only sore when I’ve been sitting or lying down, and the pain goes away after moving around for a few minutes. I’m sure the reduced distances during the taper will help them heal up.

After the “Volume Overload” of last week described above, this week is supposed to be “Intensity Focussed” with a couple of quick, longish type interval sessions. I’m modifying things slightly so I have some more recovery time, and reducing my planned 28km run on the coming weekend down closer to the 20km mark as the last thing I want to do now is aggravate anything in the last 3 weeks. From what I’ve read 28km with 2 weeks to go might be a little bit of overkill anyway.

It’s funny that Don was asking about my carbo load/nutrition/hydration plans as I was in the process of finalising them at the time, and will put them in writing next week.

I actually did a mini carbo load in the lead up to the long run. By mini I mean I didn’t eat quite as much as I expect to for the marathon, and only did it from lunchtime Wednesday to mid afternoon Friday. So a bit shorter and a bit less just to see how it goes. I think it worked fairly well and I’m comfortable with increasing the load for the real thing.

Week 14 of 18 – Recovery Week

Monday 5km Run
Easy recovery run not far from home.


Tuesday 13km Tempo Run
I hadn’t been along Lighthouse Beach for a while so that’s where I went this morning. Then I made my way through Marbuk and Emerald Downs, along Ocean Drive, Koala Street and home.
I had 2 x 15 metre tempo efforts today (at about 1 hour race pace) with a 5 minute jog recovery, although I realised during the cool down that I was still a fair way from home so I threw in a further 10 minute effort on the way back!


Thursday 10km VO2 Intervals
I set my alarm for the wrong day so it didn’t go off this morning at 5 but I woke up at 5.30am anyway, so I only lost half an hour of the yard work I was going to do between the run and starting work…still trimmed a few hedges though!
I made my way down to Wayne Richards Park on Koala Street for 6 x 600m intervals (at 5km race pace) with 90 second jog recoveries.
As with last weeks session I put in some relaxed but solid efforts, dodging some uneven ground here and there. I did them all fairly consistently at about 2:20 to 2:30 minutes each.


Saturday 18km Long Run
It’s interesting that I hit a sluggish phase through the 30-40 minute mark, which was the same point as occurred during a long run quite a few weeks ago.
So today I ran along Pacific Drive to Town Beach, along the river to Settlement City, through Clifton and back home via Gordon and Lord Streets.
I was a bit behind schedule with about 4km to go so I picked up the pace a bit to the finish. The last 3km was uphill for a fair part of the way, but it didn’t seem too tough even at the quicker pace, and still felt like an aerobic effort. I think that I’d just been plodding along for most of the run when I really could/should have been going a bit quicker.

Week 13 of 18

Monday 6km Run
This was a very easy recovery run to get the legs moving. It was very slow too at 7min/km, with some tightness and soreness in a couple of spots. Better for the run though.


Tuesday 13km Run
Mostly aerobic, but had 2 x 8 minute efforts thrown in with a 3 minute jog recovery. Went over to Peakhurst, Oatley, etc.. Felt much better than yesterday’s effort - no doubt helped by the massage I got last night to work out some of those tight spots. Felt like a million bucks after the massage and the run.


Thursday 10.5km with 4x800m intervals
With the hill session part of the program now complete, the Thursday/Friday sessions now change to “VO2” intervals, which are intended to be run at 3-5km race pace on a soft surface.
After a 20 minute warmup I arrived at Renown Park for the intervals. Using Google Earth I measured that a lap and a bit was 800m, but part of the park was a bit slushy after the overnight rain so I reworked the laps so they were still pretty close to 800m.
I didn’t run the intervals too hard, but they were solid efforts in around 3:20-3:30 minutes each, with 2 minute jog recoveries.
Another easy 20 minutes or so afterwards was a good cool down.


Saturday 30km Run
I did exactly the same run down to Lake Cathie as my 30km run a month ago, mainly because I didn’t get around to working out another 30km route.
I think I ran a better plan this time, taking it very easy for the first 10km, then building the intensity a little over the next 20km. I felt really good for the whole run, finding it very comfortable to keep the pace up through the first 25km, and handling the hills for the last 5km really well – all the way up to Astronomers Terrace. It wasn’t as humid this time, but in comparison I did this one so much easier and felt great all round at the end and for the day or two afterwards.
I finished in around 2 hours 50 min, which was a few minutes ahead of last time, so I’m pleased to have a quicker finish and come through in much better shape.

I was surprised by how few cyclists were out on the IM course this morning, but figured that most would be looking to be training during race conditions, which would mean they’d be looking to train through the middle of the day rather than at dawn.

Week 12 of 18

This week saw the end of February arrive, during which I covered 208km. Not bad for me over a short month!


Monday 6km Run – 4 x 3 minute Intervals
Short run around the Waniora area incorporating a few intervals with 1 minute jog recoveries.


Tuesday 14km Aerobic Run
An easy paced run through the Dahlsford and Greenmeadows Estates, in to Gordon Street and back home via Pacific Drive.


Thursday 11km - 10 minute effort + 5 x 2 minute Hill Reps
After a foggy drive to Sydney in the morning I had to do this session in the evening.
After a warm up through Oatley I put in a 10 minute effort through Mortdale that took me to the bottom of the hill starting in Grove Ave and going around the corner into Princes St at Penshurst. It was the only suitable hill I could think of in the area that could sustain 2 minute reps, and turned out to be an interesting one as it started off moderately, eased slightly through the mid section before rising more sharply for the last hundred metres or so.
The first 3 reps were pretty solid, and I was pushing hard mostly at the top. For the last 2 reps I started pushing harder from the beginning, and ended up around 15 metres further up the hill for these than I did on the earlier reps. They were hard work though and at the end of the final rep I was really struggling. Somehow I made the 1km cool down in about 6 minutes despite feeling like I was doing a tough 9 minute/km shuffle.


Saturday 36km Long Run
In looking for somewhere reasonably flat and not involving too much traffic in Sydney I decided to borrow from the Sydney Striders Airport Adventure route. I did the 19km option plus the 12km option plus an extra 5km along the foreshore. I did them in the reverse direction and starting from near the corner of Bestic St and The Grand Parade so that I’d deal with the road sections early in the run and not have to worry about crossing roads later on when I started to get tired. There was a decent mix of terrain involved, covering cycle/walk ways, road and grass at various stages. It also got me back to the car after 19km so I could refill the bottles with cold drinks out of the esky and pick up a hat and sunnies which were not required in the darkness at the start of the run!

In the darkness of the early stages I became what we used to refer to back in my flying days as “temporarily uncertain of position” at a couple of the off the beaten track turning points, but managed to stay on course by stopping and checking the map. There were some hills and stairs to climb during the road sections, but once on the Botany Bay cycleway it was pretty much flat cycle paths. I had started off conservatively so I made it back to the car in good shape and only a few minutes behind schedule. It was getting close to 8am at this stage and the day was warming up considerably already.

The second lap was a similar route, with the mid section cut out, and once I got back to the foreshore I headed away from the start/finish along the cycle path to add in the extra 5km.

At close to 3 hours I felt a bit of a cramp behind the 2nd/3rd toes of my left foot, but changing their position and flexing the toes dealt with that and it didn’t trouble me again. What did trouble me was the fatigue over the last half hour. It was getting hot, and it turns out to be true what they say about beyond the 32km point being a challenge all of its own. My focus was really narrowing and I could see the Novotel in the distance, but it looked so far away and I was parked another kilometre past it!! At 3 hr 20 min I succumbed, and had to walk for a few minutes. My legs didn’t want to start running again, but I forced myself to pick a point to get going again. After that the last 2 or 3 kilometres were easier because of the short break and I knew the end was so close. I finally got back to the car in 3 hours 40 minutes, which was 10 minutes over what I planned. I was pretty happy with that because it was hot and humid, and I knew my legs were still tired from one of my toughest hill sessions to date on just a day and a half recovery (rather than the usual 2 full days).

During the run I had my 4 bottle fuel belt plus 2 x 250ml handheld bottles to be used first and binned.
The bottles were filled with 50 / 50 water and PB electrolyte plus a couple of serves of Endura electrolyte and I used 3 Endura gels. I had a banana, piece of toast and a Sustagen, a serve of Endura electrolyte and plenty of water before leaving home.

I didn’t have any troubles with any of the nutritional/hydration arrangements, and didn’t need a pit stop until after the run - no doubt due to the amount I was sweating out.

I used my new Asics GT 2120’s for the 2nd time today. I wasn’t sure about using them for a long run so soon, so I took another pair just in case I wanted to change at half way. That wasn’t required though and they felt great through the entire run. This is the pair I’ll use at Canberra, and they’ll see a few more long runs in the meantime.

I had some food while I walked to a shady section to stretch for half an hour before heading to Taren Point to pick up some more Bodyglide. I then ducked over to Cronulla for a swim to find that the NSW surf titles were being held along the entire length of the beach. The place was packed so I faced the long walk to the beach and had a nice soak in the ocean despite the beach being closed due to “dangerous surf conditions”. Yeah, right. My legs felt so much better after that.
I had an afternoon nap before making my legs endure several hours standing up at a BBQ/party before they got some real rest.

Sunday was a big sleep in, before loosening the legs up in the pool for about 40 minutes. There are a couple of spots with some minor aches and a bit of tightness, but nothing some stretching won’t fix. Overall I’ve come through better than I could expect for the day after.