Monday 16th June 2014
Cycling (00:58:22 / 16.78 Miles / 16.50 MPH / HRZ 2 / Cadence 76)
My normal Monday commute and it was lovely to be cycling in warm weather.
The ride down wasn’t particularly speedy but coming home seemed to just fly along and it was a fastest ride home ever.
Swimming (00:44:21 / 1800M)
Club swim tonight which was un-coached. I mostly just did an endurance set of 750M repeats then a few sprints thrown in at the end. Not big distance but at least it got the arms and legs turning over.
Tuesday 17th June 2014
Running (00:54:40 / 6.41 Miles /00:08:31 per mile / HRZ 2)
An early morning run again with David before work and once again we were greeted with an absolutely glorious morning. The sun was out, there was no wind and the River Lagan looked fantastic. I love these early morning runs, despite the early start it is nice once you are up and about.
David was suffering from a bit of a niggle in his hip, so we stopped a couple of times for him to stretch it out, which he did with some sort of Yoga-tastic elasticity, which thankfully no one else observed as it may have raised a few eyebrows.
The pace was actually just what I wanted as the next day was the Lisburn Half Marathon and I was trying to preserve my legs a bit for the next day.
It was good to get the run done and it left me feeling fresh for the Half Marathon.
On Tuesday evening some of us from the Club had the pleasure of having a Run Technique and Form analysis carried out by Iain Getty. Iain is a local Physio and funnily enough has a large clientele from the Club.
This was a real insight as I’ve never actually seen myself run on video before and it was quite surprising.
In short, I don’t swing my arms enough (or at all basically) and what movement there is, is too much side to side rather then back to front. Also, I slightly over stride and need to lean forward more and look up.
I wonder how I’ve managed to run at all over these years with such bad technique.
It was good craic doing the session and Stevie Bloomer has wound up with another nickname now as “Usain” given his Gazelle like running style.
It will take a bit of effort and time to implement some of the changes but I will try to work on them one at a time.
Wednesday 18th June 2014
Swimming ( 01:11:34 / 3000M)
Back in the pool early again and a straight endurance session of 4 X 750M. I think it went really well. Interestingly the first 750M felt fairly tough although the time didn’t portray that.
This is exactly the sort of swim training that I think I need at the moment and given the low volume last week I am keen to step it up a bit this week.
Overall a good session and I’m pleased enough with the pace and particularly the level of effort vs. comfort.
Running (01:44:49 / 13.14 Miles /00:07:58 per mile / HRZ 3)
Lisburn Half Marathon
Possibly my favourite event of the year and certainly my most long standing event. This year was my 11th straight year running the Half Marathon and I went in to it very optimistic of a PB given my decent form and run training recently.
As with most of my events I like to have a plan to try to stick to, and this time it was to run flat 8 Mins per mile and if there was a pacer for 1H 45 Mins I would stick with them.
Perversely I was looking forward to this being a really hot evening and I wasn’t disappointed. It was over 20 degrees and I saw this as good training for Zurich where it is likely to be substantially warmer than this, so I need to get used to it.
I was delighted to see that there was indeed a pacer for 1:45 and I was hopeful then that my plan would work.
Keara and the Kids were down with Pond park Primary school and they had an exceptional turn out of over 250 people running in the 3K fun run, including Ben who came home in a respectable 14 minutes. Not too bad.
As the gun went off it looked like this was the biggest crowd I had run in at this event. I rapidly lost touch with the pacers as the crowd made it impossible to keep a steady pace and I had to zigzag through hundreds of people.
It was easily a mile before I got back to the pacers who at one point were about 300M ahead of me.
The crowds didn’t really thin out until about the three mile mark which was a bit of a nuisance but great to see the event be so successful.
It was around here that the first water station was and I thought I would be sensible and take on a bit of fluid. Just as well I didn’t rally need it as most of the water in the cup went over me, up my nose and in my eyes. What did go in my mouth wound up choking me and I choked for about half a mile. I hate drinking from cups when trying to run.
I caught up again to the pacers and was feeling fairly good as we progressed through 5 miles and then faced on of the major challenges on the route which is a steady climb of about three quarters of a mile. It’s not steep but just a grind. I just sat right on the pacer heels and ground it out.
From there on the next two miles were fairly speedy and then the hardest part of the course as we went up Waterloo Road. The pacer shouted to everyone around him that if we could stick with him up through this section we would probably finish with him and this was enough for me to dig deep and work hard. It worked and I was able to come out the end of the road only about 30 metres behind him as I took on more water but learned my lesson this time and walked while I drank.
I knew that the downhill stretch for the next mile or so would give me a chance to catch up, which it did but it took the whole mile as he stepped up his pace down the hill a bit also.
I kept calm and didn’t panic in to pushing too hard to catch him and it paid off.
At 11 miles I was running beside him and starting to press on a bit as I knew we only had 2 miles to go and the PB was well and truly on the cards.
With one mile to go I knew I had a PB and I really started to crank it up as much as I could. The last 400M were a bit of a mad dash and I was delighted to finish in 1.44.49. A PB by five minutes and most importantly another confidence boost ahead of Zurich.
Notably I had a negative split run again (which is becoming a speciality for me) by doing the second half of the course one minute faster than the first. This is really satisfying and usually signifies good pacing and strength.
I finished 262nd out of 1063 finishers. I’m delighted with that and was 39th out of 119 in my Age Group.
The PB is very satisfying and faster than I could have hoped for a year ago.
Friday 20th June 2014
Swimming ( 01:32:36 / 3800M)
Full Ironman Swim Distance
Another early session and this time I was hoping to get the full IM distance swim done.
Thankfully 152 lengths and 3800M later I got out of the pool felling pretty fresh and pleased to have knocked the distance out.
Timing wise it wasn’t bad and when I look back a couple of years ago to this sort of session, I am about 3 minutes faster, which is not too bad but I think the biggest difference is that previously I would have crawled out of the pool and curled up in an exhausted ball, whereas I am now feeling OK. That’s the main aim as I want to complete the swim and feel fresh heading out on the bike.
Given the relatively low volume of swimming last week I wanted a bigger week this week and it certainly was bigger.
8600M of swimming which is just under 5.4 miles. It feels good to have it done.
The weekend hopefully will be a big one also, with a 20 mile run and a cycle of 110 miles. Hopefully the weather will be kind to me.
No comments:
Post a Comment