of running and stuff

finally got my legs moving again tonight with a fairly steady run from the gym. 3.5miles ish in about 30mins, rather damp but not actually raining. to be honest if i had just borrowed these legs this morning, i wouldn’t have been able to tell they’d run a marathon last weekend. so my recovery has been swifter than i expected.

to warm down i dropped into the pool for 400m in about 7:56 which is not too bad.

received my start time today for stratford triathlon on the 9th and i’m off at 8:30ish which is positively crack of dawn compared to last years start time after 10am. quite looking forward to it although always nervous about the swim bit, that said there were many times last sunday when i considered i’d have rather been doing a tri not a marathon.

[this weeks totals: 0.4km swim 0miles bike 3.5miles run]

i can’t confess to any excercise recently.. but i have been considering ways of avoiding the traffic next year and have concluded that hiring a narrow boat is the solution allowing us to moor up only a few yards from the start. i just need to find out how hard it is to fly one of those things.

suffering from a strange numb left shin/ankle problem at the moment, when i mentioned it to the doctor last time he told me to stay active *rolls eyes* problem is if i go again he may refer me to physio who will then tell me they have an 8month waiting list which is a shame as i had kind of intended on using my leg again sooner than that.

i can also report a success in the wine selection for last night, a most excellent trebbiano chardonnay from italy, as always i shall make a mental note to buy it again if the option arises and promptly forget.

also my period of burying my head in the sand and not checking for interesting new jobs to apply for has been brought to an end as one of my colleagues forwarded me an interesting looking vacancy in an F1 team. curses, i shall have to apply for it i suppose although i dont strictly meet all the requirements (does anyone ever?) or i’ll be left wondering forever. but it’s such a hassle revamping the CV… preparing for interviews… and then the mental anguish of my excessive loyalty and having to actually make the decision to leave my current job if i do get an offer.. which is why i’ve been carefully looking the other way for the past 6months.

would you look at that! a whole entry almost entirely unrelated to running & stuff.

i considered very briefly a short recovery run tonight, but instead i’ve retired to lick my wounds with a beer following a tasty mushroom stroganoff.

i was aiming to take split times every 5miles but inevitably missed a few markers as my brainpower deteriorated throught the race. they tell their own story:

which courtesy of excel looks like this:

anyone care to play spot the wall?

yesterday was marathon day for me, which i approached not really knowing how prepared i was. Sure i did the 35miler in february and have had a few long runs since then but not as much running as i’m used to since the tri training has been ramping up.

the weather was amazing, a bit too amazing for marathon running especially with a 1 o’clock start. unfortunately this drew all the tourists and day-trippers to stratford along with a few thousand runners. we queued for a good mile to get into town only to find the car park we were aiming for was already full and having to queue a bit more.

managed to catch a few runnersworld peeps before the start, but by that stage i was already too hot. i knew it wasn’t going to be pleasant and just wanted to get on with it. also caught up with a few cov-tri types on the start line although either doing the half or the full much quicker than me.

after standing in the midday sun on the start line for 10minutes we were off, started by some footballer chap. after a quick loop round town and some wiggling round residential streets we were off into the countryside. for once i managed to keep my early pace under reasonable control quickly getting a couple of minutes ahead of schedule but keeping that two minutes fairly constant after that.

not sure what to say about the first lap, it’s all nice and scenic and stuff, with a couple of climbs. i’ve been round this course so many times before so i probably
don’t notice much of the detail.

at about 9miles i treated myself to a rather melted jaffa-cake and hooked up with a first timer called stephen. we chatted and ran down the disused rail line and round to the half way point together. he was looking for a 3:45 time but by this stage we were running 9:30 / 10:00 min/mile, i knew this was putting me behind my schedule but i knew the heat & sun were taking it out of me, so was happy to oblige!

i passed half way at 2:02 and decided to push on. second time up the hills was unpleasant but just about bearable, going down again was much worse! i caught and passed a few people who had passed us on the railway section which was nice but i really had no idea if i could keep them behind me.

the second lap goes further out and hits the rail line at about 20miles. psychologically this is a bad place for me! it’s exposed, hot and seemingly eternal, i DNF’d here 2 years ago with heat stroke. the gravel surface crunches underfoot and it’s the only sound you here for the next 5miles.

i start to really struggle here and i know my pace has plummeted to 12 or 13 mins/mile, looking at my watch i’ll be lucky to beat my time of 4:20 from last year, hopefully i can hang on to avoid a personal worst time!

i’m allowing myself to walk through the water stations, and for 30seconds after each mile marker. in between it’s just head down… crunch crunch crunch.

extra walking breaks start to creep in and even when i’m back on the road doing the out & back mileage adjustment loop it’s as much as i can do to break into the occasional pitiful plod!

onto the path by the river now, the town is in sight. ‘mind over matter’ a spectator encourages me and its head down again with as much as i can muster. i’m looking a few metres ahead of me, the peak of my cap blocks my mind from how much further i have to go and prevents me from making eye contact with the spectators.

200m to go seems like an eternity but i can lift my pace now and olbigingly lift my head for lisa & the camera. 4:35ish on my watch and i’m just pleased to have survived (i’ve seen more collapses and ambulances than i care to think about this race, and apparently the air ambulance had to put in an appearance too).

my calves feel solid and i feel sick, sipping water cautiously.
i look around for somewhere discrete to throw up… by the marquee? by the path? by the finish area? oh well here will have to do then. the fluids that have been swilling around not being absorbed for the last 5miles empty themselves. i feel much better.

as usual the release from th mental effort of the last 5miles makes me want to cry. it was a steaming day and a dismal time for me, i console myself that i made it, and i’m not in hospital.

at the time of course i’m never going to do anything like that again, but this annoying psychology means i will.

[this weeks totals: 2km swim 0miles bike 37.95miles run]

just to add.. did the gym run on thursday.. wanted to go slow but didn’t.
probably a bad idea.

[this weeks totals: 2km swim 0miles bike 11.75miles run]

well before tea i sat down to write about my run this evening, nothing exciting just the regular 8 mile loop. i have some split times to share but it’s all just been eclipsed by watching the bbc’s documentary on roger bannisters 4 minute mile.

i have no doubt that right at this second there’s a thread on runnersworld growing by several posts a minute.
so keep an eye out for the repeat or beg/steal/borrow a video of it! fab documentary and inspirational stuff, surely for non runners as well as runners.

top stuff.

[this weeks totals: 2km swim 0miles bike 8miles run]

well i’m feeling quite pleased and putting my feet up to treat myself to a low fat toffee flavour yoghurt.
hehe, how virtuous does that sound? it’s not true i promise (well the bit about the yoghurt is), reminds me of tales of paula radcliffe celebrating by having a diet coke… woohoo!

anyway, despite still having numbers penned on my arms and legs from saturdays race i braved the pool this evening.

i decided on a straight pyramid session (with a flat top) of 100m-200m-300m-400m and then the same in reverse with about a minute between. generally a nice quiet pool with people keeping out the way, although i may have been steamrollering a bit at times, but thats just how it goes when you get into a comfortable rhythm.

splits as follows:

and they pretty much tell the tale of my swim, a quick start, respectable (for me) 400m times midway, slowing as i got tired with the 2nd 300m seeing my form falling apart as i just couldnt seem to co-ordinate my arms! oh and i managed the last 100m with bi-lateral breathing, although i couldnt have done much more.

overall 2000m in 40minutes…… which i’m chuffed with… and gave me the scary thought: that extrapolates to an ironman swim time of 1:20, luckily i’m in no hurry to do IM (half maybe).

anyway what was i saying about focus? down to the yoghurt.

[this weeks totals: 2km swim 0miles bike 0miles run]

are now up at www.covtri.co.uk in excel format.

14th overall and 7th in category….. i’m trying not to keep working out where i’d have been without the extra 50m swim (about a mintue quicker)…. but they kept telling me i wasnt allowed to win anything anyway

well since i’ve started doing the running thing i’ve been pretty cynical about the london marathon… the hype, the crowds, the lottery entry system etc, but i must admit i started to connect a little watching it today.

the training, the effort, the determined looks at 21miles… all these people separately toiling away for the past few months.

it might not get me next year…. but sometime soon i think i’ll be feeling the call to enter, although i’d best start soon as the chances of getting in are pretty slim.

and whilst i must tray and stay focussed on the challenges i’ve set myself for this year….. i keep worrying what i’ll do next year as i should really focus on running OR triathlon. i’m tempted to have a year when i focus on marathons.. and a year i focus on triathlons…. but then there are always new and exciting challenges to tempt me.

focus focus focus.

nice easy week for me really… but then i do have a marathon next weekend, even so i can’t help feeling a bit porky.

thursday was a gym run (as well as to/from) on a new route that was out & back with a couple of laps on some allotments. unfortunately by the time we got to the allotments i’d been psyched up into trying to lap them by dong 3 laps, which i didn’t think i could do… and i didn’t by a couple of hundred metres. was rather shagged on the way back tho’.

home->gym 2miles 14:55
@ gym 9:23
gym -> gym 3.7miles 31:30
@gym 9:44
gym->home 2miles 16:24

after a rest day on friday i was meant to be marshalling at the tri club’s aquathlon in warwick. it turned out to be a really nice day for the event which is 400m swim in the pool, pop your shoes on and 2 laps of the park (alledgedly 2.1miles).
having been assigned duties marshalling the run course i found we had marshalls at all the turns already which left me meandering around at the transition/finish area.
once things had kicked off and it became clear i wasn’t really needed…. i accidentally went and entered.

i set off on the swim like a torpedo, well relative to how fast i normally swim! which obviously i couldnt quite sustain but felt good anyway. now the process is that the lane counter sticks a board in the water when you have 2 lengths to go so you know to get out next time round…. did i see it? nope.
i was counting in my head too and obviously miscounted, i was worried when i had counted to 350m and didnt see a board but it never occured to me that that was cos i missed it, i was worried that i had another 100 to go…

out to the rather minimalist transition area where i struggled to force my shoes over my wet feet, tucked my cap into my shorts and ran off whilst putting my top on. this bit was good fun as none of the run marshalls will have been expecting to see a club top coming round. the 2nd lap nearly saw me taken out by a dog which i managed to hurdle.

well worth a mention was the incredible maggie who raced with us today, she’s blind. her guide talked her through the swim and led her round the run course to a humbling finish! …oh, and she wants to do a triathlon later… .fair play.

anyway, the results: i was 14th in a credible 21minutes (could have been top10 without that extra 50m)… the winning time was an obscene 15minutes something. i’ll link to full results when they’re up on the cov tri site later.

lisa did a good job in her st. johns kit but didnt get har hands on any casualties.

after that it was home for some lunch and then off to the beer festival, where us two lightweights managed a pint and a half each before slinking off home to sleep it off.

[this weeks totals: 0.4km swim 22miles bike 9.7miles run]

[beer drunk
Newc'y Black, 5.1%, Fernandes Brewery (West Yorks), strong dark stout!
Black Pig Mild, 3.6%, Bazens Brewery (Gtr Manchester), much easier drinking.
Space Trotter, 3.8%, Slaughterhouse (Warwickshire), sweeter hoppy beer... swapped with lisa's:
Piddlebrook, 3.8%, Rainbow (Coventry), slightly sweet... sour... what i call 'grapefruity' which is strange as i dont like grapefruit.
lisa also drank:
Aviator, 4.0%, Dent Brewery (Cumbria)
1066, 6.0%, Hampshire Brewery (guess!) ]

incidentally try typing brewery sometime, its quite satisfying with the rewer bit