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Tuesday 17 March 2009

"Pain is weakness leaving your body"

OMG! Today was a painful battle. The winds of torment were yet again blowing in neighbouring Lancs, this time on the 200m bend and into the home straight; those 800m reps were a killer. Set out to do 8x800m today but floundered at 6 with very tired quads after a heavy first week back to full training. M was by comparison looking very fresh and frisky and ran an excellent and consistent session. I think my attempts to squeeze in some extra long runs last week have been a temporary lapse in my usually sensible approach to training. I've been feeling panicked at the lack of long runs in preparation for Wilmslow in recent weeks and have resorted to slipping in the odd 14 or 15 when it really isn't a good idea, particularly when sandwiched between hill reps and interval sessions. I initially managed to maintain 2.40-2.41 target pace for the reps but my legs started to feel like lead at the midway point. Decided to reduce the effort after 6 reps and squeezed out 2x400m for the last two instead. My quads were screaming on the warm down. I'm definitely more than ready for my regular massage slot with Maggie the Menston mauler on Thursday.

Here's another rather pleasing (to me at least) pic of all the laps run around Nelson track today. It's such a fantastic spot compared to our usual, slightly oddly smelly haunt in Keighley, (those of you who've trained there will be right with me reliving the gassy aroma I'm sure). I'm definitely gonna try to make it over to Nelson for our intervals through the summer. It's so quiet and a really nicely maintained facility. We rarely run into other runners there because of the location and so can feel like our own personal training ground. After more tinkering I've now published a nifty graph of my splits from today complete with heart rate % overlaid for added drama. Though there's a pleasing hedgehog effect I'm not sure I was working hard enough in the latter quarter. My heart and lungs felt fine but my quads started to tie up pretty quickly and sometimes you know you're pushing your luck by trying to carry on.
Have been working on the quads tonight and am hopeful I'll recover to have a reasonable if not slightly tired XC run on Saturday at Ruthin. I'm sure our magic massage device (Novasonic Popular Plus!) will be getting lots of use over the next couple of days and is always a great excuse to loll about on the settee and watch a film. Plans for tomorrow include a nice steady trot with Tricky in the morning around Fewston & Swinsty reservoirs. This is a very runnable and picturesque track and a route I've really missed through the winter. Today felt like spring has definitely arrived and being off work has been a great chance to revisit our off road training routes. I'm sure the legs are grateful for the change in terrain and I'm hoping my chalky white legs will benefit from a few rays after a long winter of light deprivation. If only I could get rid of the last summer's short marks and have legs that are all one colour.

2 comments:

kate said...

wear your short marks with pride ;)

...8x800 sounds like a lot-would you recomend that for longer distance runners?

Runningbear said...

Hi Kate, I think it's supposed to be a great quality session for anyone running from 5k to half marathon distances though you're right that it's quite a tough session. I'd say that base running fitness and leg strength need to be pretty good already to support it. Also depends on how hard/fast and how many reps you choose etc.

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