My 500th post!! Hopefully this will take my hit counter up to 100,000!
Monday: 10K @ 3:38 w/ 3% incline
Tuesday: 45' @ 4:00
Wednesday: 3 x (200-600-1,000) @ < 3:00, 3:10-3:25, 3:40-3:30, w/ 3-4' rest between sets
Thursday: 45' @ 4:00
Friday: 3' @ 3:00, 2' @ 3:00 + 10 x (1' @ 3:00, 1' @ 6:00) + 40' @ 4:00 (evening)
Saturday: 40' @ 4:00 (morning) + 40' @ 4:00 (afternoon)
Sunday: 40' @ 4:00 (morning) + 40' @ 4:00 (afternoon)
Total kilometres: 95
I can remember not all that long ago trying to run 10K at my then race pace of 40 minutes in training on the treadmill and finding it impossible; now, of course, I am running 10 and more at that pace as a "recovery run". However, the plan for Monday was to run 10K at my now current race pace of 3:38 per kilometre - which equates to my PB of 36:35 - with an incline of 3% on the treadmill. As my treadmill runs a little slow, I set the speed to 17 kph which meant that I did cheat ever so slightly, as I completed the 10K a minute faster than was "really" the case. Still, I was very happy with my effort and it has served its purpose to convince me both consciously and - hopefully - subconsciously that I can beat this time come next Sunday. I did notice my calf muscles a little sorer than usual, possibly from the continuous running up hill (even if it was only a slight incline), so I put my Compex electrostimulator to work on them and was fine by the next day.
The series on Wednesday were much harder than I expected. What a difference a rest makes! I think there is also a psychological effect of going from faster to slower, that the easing up of the pace provides less relief than you expect as you are still recovering from the faster pace. I did the first one at the upper end of the range (200 @ 20 kph, 600 @ 19-18 kph, 1,000 @ 17 kph) but stopped 300m into the second one and did the third one at the lower end of the range - also with a brief pause - (200 @ 20 kph, 600 @ 17.5 kph, 1,000 @ 16.5 kph). I had based the target paces on my current pace for "stand alone" intervals of 200, 600 and 1,000m, banking on the fact that I would be able to manage having only to do 3 of them but the first one took a lot out of me. Next time I will be a little less ambitious and hope to do all 3 at the same speeds.
This week I am chomping my way through Homeland Season 2. Having said that, the vVO2Max session on Friday was too intense to be able to watch anything on the telly (computer). In my quest to build up to the 5 x 3' @ 3:00 (20 kph) I managed to do one of these, followed by another of 2' and the rest of intervals of 1 minute on / 1 minute off, up to a total of 15 minutes. If I keep improving at this rate, perhaps I can gradually extend the time I run at (nearly) World Record Marathon pace a minute at a time until I get to just over two hours... This is something that has fascinated me for some time about distance running. While it may seem to me impressive but not unbelievable that the winners of a race are completing the same distance as me in about 25% less time, to think that I could probably run about 2 kilometres to exhaustion at the same pace that they are able to run a further 40 kilometres!That is to say, not 25% further but 2100% further!! It reminds me of the 10K race I ran last year which started at the same time as the Madrid Marathon - I started in the very front line and found myself running "with the Africans" for the first 700 metres or so, before they dumped me. What an exhilarating experience that was, as well as humbling.
In summary, the training plan for this week was a little too ambitious or, put another way, I did not allow enough weeks of build up to get to the level I was aiming for. The idea was to try out this plan before adopting in a little more seriously for the 10K in London and Half Marathon in the Hague I plan to run next year. The good thing is that I have learned something this time around. I don't think there is any reason to doubt that I can shave off some time from my PB next week if all goes well, although whether that will be enough to dip under 36 minutes remains to be seen - I will certainly be aiming for that!
I took the kids swimming on Saturday morning and did a 10K run on the treadmill in the meantime. Since the last time I was at that gym, I've been trying to find somewhere that sold a "plyometric box" like the one I found there but, as I hadn't noted down the make of the box, I was unable to find one available in Spain. I did find some very detailed instructions on how to make one but I am not sure my DIY skills are up to the job. This time I took a photo of the box and I'm waiting to hear back from Tecnogym to see how much they charge...
In total I ran 50 km over the weekend, if you include Friday evening as part of the total. Saturday morning was a little tough as I felt like I was sweating alcohol from the departmental Christmas dinner the night before. I got to bed by about 3 am, only to be wide awake by 8. It's at times like this that I am so glad for the invention of the siesta...
We also picked up our t-shirts and chips for the San Silvestre 10K race on New Year's Eve in Madrid but it looks like we won't be here to run it: instead we may well run the (shorter) San Silvestre in Gijón.
Monday: 10K @ 3:38 w/ 3% incline
Tuesday: 45' @ 4:00
Wednesday: 3 x (200-600-1,000) @ < 3:00, 3:10-3:25, 3:40-3:30, w/ 3-4' rest between sets
Thursday: 45' @ 4:00
Friday: 3' @ 3:00, 2' @ 3:00 + 10 x (1' @ 3:00, 1' @ 6:00) + 40' @ 4:00 (evening)
Saturday: 40' @ 4:00 (morning) + 40' @ 4:00 (afternoon)
Sunday: 40' @ 4:00 (morning) + 40' @ 4:00 (afternoon)
Total kilometres: 95
I can remember not all that long ago trying to run 10K at my then race pace of 40 minutes in training on the treadmill and finding it impossible; now, of course, I am running 10 and more at that pace as a "recovery run". However, the plan for Monday was to run 10K at my now current race pace of 3:38 per kilometre - which equates to my PB of 36:35 - with an incline of 3% on the treadmill. As my treadmill runs a little slow, I set the speed to 17 kph which meant that I did cheat ever so slightly, as I completed the 10K a minute faster than was "really" the case. Still, I was very happy with my effort and it has served its purpose to convince me both consciously and - hopefully - subconsciously that I can beat this time come next Sunday. I did notice my calf muscles a little sorer than usual, possibly from the continuous running up hill (even if it was only a slight incline), so I put my Compex electrostimulator to work on them and was fine by the next day.
The series on Wednesday were much harder than I expected. What a difference a rest makes! I think there is also a psychological effect of going from faster to slower, that the easing up of the pace provides less relief than you expect as you are still recovering from the faster pace. I did the first one at the upper end of the range (200 @ 20 kph, 600 @ 19-18 kph, 1,000 @ 17 kph) but stopped 300m into the second one and did the third one at the lower end of the range - also with a brief pause - (200 @ 20 kph, 600 @ 17.5 kph, 1,000 @ 16.5 kph). I had based the target paces on my current pace for "stand alone" intervals of 200, 600 and 1,000m, banking on the fact that I would be able to manage having only to do 3 of them but the first one took a lot out of me. Next time I will be a little less ambitious and hope to do all 3 at the same speeds.
This week I am chomping my way through Homeland Season 2. Having said that, the vVO2Max session on Friday was too intense to be able to watch anything on the telly (computer). In my quest to build up to the 5 x 3' @ 3:00 (20 kph) I managed to do one of these, followed by another of 2' and the rest of intervals of 1 minute on / 1 minute off, up to a total of 15 minutes. If I keep improving at this rate, perhaps I can gradually extend the time I run at (nearly) World Record Marathon pace a minute at a time until I get to just over two hours... This is something that has fascinated me for some time about distance running. While it may seem to me impressive but not unbelievable that the winners of a race are completing the same distance as me in about 25% less time, to think that I could probably run about 2 kilometres to exhaustion at the same pace that they are able to run a further 40 kilometres!That is to say, not 25% further but 2100% further!! It reminds me of the 10K race I ran last year which started at the same time as the Madrid Marathon - I started in the very front line and found myself running "with the Africans" for the first 700 metres or so, before they dumped me. What an exhilarating experience that was, as well as humbling.
In summary, the training plan for this week was a little too ambitious or, put another way, I did not allow enough weeks of build up to get to the level I was aiming for. The idea was to try out this plan before adopting in a little more seriously for the 10K in London and Half Marathon in the Hague I plan to run next year. The good thing is that I have learned something this time around. I don't think there is any reason to doubt that I can shave off some time from my PB next week if all goes well, although whether that will be enough to dip under 36 minutes remains to be seen - I will certainly be aiming for that!
I took the kids swimming on Saturday morning and did a 10K run on the treadmill in the meantime. Since the last time I was at that gym, I've been trying to find somewhere that sold a "plyometric box" like the one I found there but, as I hadn't noted down the make of the box, I was unable to find one available in Spain. I did find some very detailed instructions on how to make one but I am not sure my DIY skills are up to the job. This time I took a photo of the box and I'm waiting to hear back from Tecnogym to see how much they charge...
In total I ran 50 km over the weekend, if you include Friday evening as part of the total. Saturday morning was a little tough as I felt like I was sweating alcohol from the departmental Christmas dinner the night before. I got to bed by about 3 am, only to be wide awake by 8. It's at times like this that I am so glad for the invention of the siesta...
We also picked up our t-shirts and chips for the San Silvestre 10K race on New Year's Eve in Madrid but it looks like we won't be here to run it: instead we may well run the (shorter) San Silvestre in Gijón.
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