Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Got the bug again

Had a great unproductive time at work yesterday tracking everyone's progress at Boston. I actually tracked 9 different people I knew running (although I guess I don't really know Lance Armstrong!) Each had their own tale to tell and most followed the same pattern of starting off strong and losing their way during the hills then not being able to pick it up again the last few miles (all except Lance of course who appeared to run a great race despite not being in the sub 2.40 shape that had been rumoured)

It was actually really exciting being able to track everyone every 5k. I was following friends from different parts of the world and little did they know that they were passing each other back and forth! The biggest 'crash' was performed by one of my best mates from England, a 2.40 marathoner who despite having not trained particularly well due to injury went out in 16.50 for the first 5k! I was very concerned at this point and having gone through the half in 1.16 he eventually finished in 2.58 by which point he must have been practically walking.

All the excitement really got my taste buds flowing to get my second marathon under my belt. So I'm considering various options at the moment. A leading contender is Chicago although I might already be too late (?) and it would also mean doing my training through the horrible summer here. We'll see

So I went out and hit the track again tonight. After a 2 mile warm up I did a similar version of Tusca's '10 day out' workout, hoping that the benefits of this get the chance to kick in by Saturday. 5*800/400 with 200m jog (1.00) after the 800 and 400m jog (2.00) after the 400. Goal was to hit 2.30/70 throughout. Didn't quite make that but a solid, tough workout nonetheless-

1: 2:33/70
2: 2:32/71
3: 2:30/72
4: 2:30/70
5: 2:30/72

Tomorrow will be my first planned rest day in months so i feel I'm getting there at last. My right calf was a little bit sore after but putting the Stick to good use should sort that out.

Also got some new shoes today (Saucony Grid Sinister), my new headphones came in the mail and so did my new Garmin. So i'm happy but broke and ironically when I want to go out and test all three as soon as possible I'm not actually going to be running until Thursday!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yo, I expect some residuals for my workout, thank you very much...

Seriously, I think your version of the workout was tougher--much quicker recoveries--come to think of it, staggeringly quick recoveries, which goes to show that you're rounding into shape quite nicely.

Now, when you're able to 800@2:30, 400m Float@Marathon Pace, you'll be PRing in no time...but that's toward the end of a season...seriously, on both accounts.

mainers said...

re the 10 day out reference i was being serious- your approach was much better as i know vo2 max workouts take a good while to kick in. thing is I'm playing catch up at the moment so all my training is a bit unstructured and off the cuff so to speak

i appreciate the comments Joseph, thanks