Primer

Just Jamie and I this morning at 6.10am for 1, 2, 3, 4, 1 min efforts off a 1 min jog recovery.  Did a 4km warm up, into it then a 5km warm down.  Throat a bit better but legs a bit lethargic so another easy day tomorrow will definitely be needed.

13km all up.  Jamie going well.  Could be a sub34 chance.

Rest and worry

A rest day for me today plus worried about a sore throat.

But had to be a proud Dad and post a picture of Maggie finishing her school x-country.  She's in Yr 2, but running against Yr 3's and some younger Yr 4's managed to finish 6th and get through to District.  Nice form and determination:

Charlie (in Yr 3 so Maggie's equivalent race for boys) was happy with his 15th as he beat his mates.  Billy slipped in a puddle after 1.5km while 8th and ended up in sick bay with ice on his ankle.

So my girls are both through to District while the boys can concentrate on their XBox skills.

Monday

Missed Monday post - 12km running home but getting a cab from Condamine.  Very slow.

2km TT

Over to ES Marks this evening for a 2km TT with some 200m's to follow which I had to miss in order to pick up Charlie.

Warmed up with Coach and his crew but had to start earlier than the rest as a result of running out of time.  One of the fast girls called Davina was to pace me through 800m in 2:20 and then I had to hold on for another 3 laps.  Felt great in the warm up and strides and conditions were cool with a bit of wind down the back straight. Main issue was a very busy track meaning a bit of weaving required.

Davina went off hard and we were though 200m in 32s.  800m in 2:18, 1km in 2:52 and finished in 5:49.7.

New PB for me today and felt able to push hard on the final lap.  Probably eased off a bit too much on lap 3.

Only time for a short warm down before jumping in the car.  

Fighting off a sore throat.  But this was a confidence booster if I can keep it at bay.

Sunday Bloody Sunday

Schedule had an hour.  So I set off later and ran the usual Sunday route in reverse expecting to bump into the lads after 30 mins for the second half.

But they never showed?  Kept on running all the way to Narrabeen Lake but still no sign.  So jogged back slowly having gone further than scheduled.  Eventually turning into Pittwater Rd with only 3km to go I see Macca and Justin storming from behind and with a km to go Macca catches me. Ran with him at the end to do 19km in 4:35's.

Nice breaky with Craig, Macca, Justin and Charlie before catching up again in the evening to watch the London Marathon.  Chuffed to see the classy Kipchoge take it out.  He's under-rated but joins the likes of Bekele, Gebreselllasie and Zatopek as someone who has won world titles at 5000m and won the most competitive marathon.  Bit disappointed by Shelley's 2:11:19.  It's an argument against negative splitting (which Shelley did).  On a course with a downhill first half, a negative split is a wasted opportunity and excessively conservative.

Saturday sess

Only got out at 4.30pm and managed to time it perfectly with the arrival of a late afternoon storm.  We avoided the hail in Manly bit still a downpour that drenched me on my 10min and 8min reps.

Session was 10, 8, 6, 4, 2 with 2min jogs inbetween - same as a couple of Tuesday's ago.  Felt better this time around.  Coach said to push the later reps and put effort in in the middle of each.  

All went well.  Ended up doing 10.98km in the 38mins and went through 10km in 34:32 (3:27's).  Faster reps were at 3:15 pace.  Ran flat loops around Nolan's, Passmore and Lakeside Crescent (3.1km loop).

3km warm up and down for 17km all up.

Easy

Flew back to Sydney in the arvo and got out for a very easy 30mins in the evening before heading to the theatre with Billy.  

Only 83km for the week having been badly disrupted by freakish weather and travel.  But managed to get the key sessions in.

Fartlekking the Tan

Flew from Perth to Melbourne early Thursday morning.  Checked into hotel and immediately changed into running clothes to get out to do the session.

Jogged 15mins from my hotel to the top of the hill of the Tan and started 20mins of fartlek (2mins on, 1min off).  Ran anti-clockwise which seemed to be the opposite to everyone else.  Felt very lethargic to start with with the legs not wanting to play ball, but eased my way into the session from 3km onwards.  Very happy with the distance on 20mins - 5.88km (3:24 pace average).

Then 5mins jog followed by 20mins tempo.  Ran clockwise this time, to get the hill over in one go and have a gentle downslope for 2.5km to follow.  Again struggled in first km then it came together.  Km splits were 3:26, 3:21, 3:39, 3:17, 3:14, 3:17 (pace) for 5.92km and a 3:22 average all up.  Clocked my lap of the Tan split at 12:59.

Then 15mins jog back to the hotel for 19km all up.  Very happy with that session given all the flying of the previous 48 hours.  Feel like I'm hitting some good form.

Wild West

So last night was spent watching the water around us rise.  Headed to Jason's next door, along with fellow neighbours John, Rob, Geoff and Tomas and a fair few crew from the Manly Daily and Daily Telegraph.  John brought around a lovely St. Hugo Shiraz and we were having a great time.  But the water kept on rising - particularly on the road in front of the house.  Headed into the house at midnight.  Kept a lookout until 2.30am when it finally started receding, but at that stage my garage was flooded and it was within 3 inches of coming into the house.  Definitely a brown pants moment, particularly as every other family in the street had sent their kids off to friends whilst mine (and my wife) slept soundly in bed oblivious to what was going on.

Went to bed, then got up at 5.30am and the water was a full metre lower than 3 hours earlier.  Got a taxi to the airport, flew to Perth.  Arrived in balmy warm and sunny conditions so ran 12.3km along lovely paths by the river in 52:29 (4:16's) before heading to the office to work out what they do over here.

Very chilled city and with the ability to run for miles without crossing a road, I like it.

Now knackered and going to bed after an eventful 24 hours.

Wild Sydney

Session was 12 x 1mim reps run hard with a rest between.  But Sydney is in the middle of a storm cell and Nolan's looked like this:

So much so, that even my youngest, Claudia, was nervous.  See figure 2:

So decided to get up to North Head (why?) and run my reps there.  Queenscliff lagoon was almost un-runnable, but eventually got there and started the reps, into the wind, from the Stone Arch.  Needless to say the first few into the wind were a farce (about 300m each), but on the return I felt like Mo Farah (350m).

Jog back for 19km all up.

Similar Sunday

1:45 on the plan for today.  Met Justin, Craig, Macca, Jamie and Quentin on Pittwater Rd (with them having done a few km beforehand) and because they were warmed up the pace was pretty solid (low 4:20's) from the off for me.

Ran to Narrabeen Lake via Cromer, did a lap of the lake then back the same way.  25km in 1:45 something (4:12's) with a 1km slow jog after to warm down.  Macca picked the pace up from the dirt track at Narrabeen Lake (just after running past recent years C2S bridesmaid Milly Clark) with just Justin and I following in his wake.

Felt great today after yesterday's rest day.  But did feel guilty at the fact everyone else was running 30km+.  In coach I trust...

60mins tempo

In Seal Rocks.  Waited until the late arvo, did a 1km warm up (not least to get the initial big hill out of the way).  Then nervously got under way.

Basically ran to Yagon on the unsealed road (4km) and back, twice then plus some.  First km is a gradual uphill the whole way and did it in 3:42 thinking hokey cow, this isn't near the 3:30's coach was expecting. But that was the slowest km.  Averaged 3:36's for the first 30mins then 3:30's for the second 30mins.  Ended up doing 17km in 60:21 (3:33's).  

Bloody tough over the undulating hills.  Felt a bit nauseous afterwards but got a lot out of it.

2km warmdown for 20km all up and 114km for the week.

Swaps

Supposed to do the hour tempo Thursday morning but too tired and slept through alarm so swapped for Fridays run and just did 30mins easy along the beach.  Beautiful morning.  6.8km.

Busy day then drove up to Seal Rocks at 7pm.  Worst night sleep ever being attacked by a gazillion mozzies.  Woke up with one eye so swollen from a mozzie bite that I could barely open it so I now look like The Elephant Man.

Easy Wed

Rolled over when the alarm went off at 5.30am.  Out at 6.45am and bumped into Justin, Macca, Darren and Erika towards the end of their run near Shelley Beach.

Ran with Macca for the rest of my 12km around the golf course and finished with 4 x 100m hills on the road leading down to Passmore.

Done but tired this morning.  Pace would have been just under 4:40's.

10, 8, 6, 4, 2

Turned up to the HuRTS session (on one fine day) where they were doing 2 x 20mins.  If you were to analyse that, my session didn't quite fit, but set off with them nonetheless (starting with marathon man Fats) and ran the same route.  Session was 10mins, 8mins, 6mins, 4mins, 2mins all with a 2 minute rest between, so a bit like a Mona Fartlek.  Most of my endurance sessions have a hard running time of 40mins, and most of my speed sessions have a hard running time of 20mins, so at 30mins this was an inbetweener.

No guidance from Coach Carter on pace so I just ran as hard as felt comfortable which turned out at 3:15 to 3:20 pace.  After the first rep the session was about to get hard.  Struggled on the 6mins and 4mins but raised something on the 2mins to almost catch Timmy.  Solid session.

Warmed down with running man Jimmy (who was keen to stop for water when he saw a pretty woman at the Farm Cove bubbler) and Jono the kite (surf) runner.  16km all up.

First Double

30mins easy to Shelley finishing at Ground Zero for some breakie. 6.5km without orthotics feeling good.  4:36's.

Bumped into Andrew Daddo at Shelley on his run - keeping the weight off post I'm a Celebrity GMOOH.

Run home

Ran home with 'Lil Jimmy showing him the way.  16.64km (went via Manly) with 4 x 100m strides towards the end.  1:20 something (4:48's).

Then settled down with Jimmy to watch Game of Thrones (woo-hoo!) then the Premier League wrap up show over pizza.  Perfect.

Seal Rocks

Coach had 90mins down.  Ran 90:01 - basically to Yagon and back twice.  Should have got up earlier and arranged a run with Quentin who was staying at Treachery, but I'm no good early in the morning when camping.  When I run that undulating route (which I reckon I've now run more than anyone in history) I always seem to run the hills strongly and work the glutes.  It meant I ended up covering 21.02km in my 90mins (4:16's).

Some great results from Canberra over the weekend, with Neil winning the Half in 71:32 (exactly the same time I ran in NY) and Craig coming 2nd in the 50km in 3:07 going through 42.2 in 2:38.  Good to see Kanser getting some form back putting a minute into Timmy in running a low 83.

Tucks continued his trail dominance in coming 2nd in the Buffalo Stampede Ultra to some Englishman - no shame in that.

Parkrun - 1st in 16:12

Bit fuzzy this morning after a few Kolsch's with Jimmy and Jason (neighbour) last night in the 4 Pines.  But coach had Parkrun followed by 10 x 30s on the program so got out and did 4+km warm up before meeting Macca, Jamie, Pete, Bruce, JohnBo and Dicky on the start line.

Felt pretty good today and light on my feet without wearing the orthotics.  Had Jamie stick with me for 1km but then gradually drop a bit.  The usual struggle between 2km and 3km but picked it up again at the end.  Km splits on my watch were 3:06, 3:14, 3:25, 3:10 and 3:08.

Jamie was told to do 3km hard, 500m easy then 1.5km hard which produced an interesting result as Macca, Dicky and Bruce all caught him right at the end with Macca coming through strongly for 3rd place in under 17mins.  He seemed pretty chuffed with that and should be.  Not sure of the bloke who came 2nd in 16:38 - he looked pretty serious doing his warm up and warm down.

Then jogged back with Jamie, Macca and Dicky with Jamie and I doing our 10 x 30s (30 on, 30 off) along the way.  30 on and 30 off means you end up running 3:45's.  So a good session all up for 15km.

Maggie's first game of netball.  She was aggressive.

Friday easy and hills

Did 20mins solo then met Erika and did 40mins with her.  Then we did 4 x 100m grass hills on Timmy's hill.  Averaged about 22s for those.

Felt good today.  14km all up.

124km for the week.  Biggest in donkies.

20 min efforts

Up at sparrows fart to lay some cones and meet Jamie and Amy, Macca and Erika for 2 x 20mins with a 5 min rest.  First 20 mins was to be fartlek (2 mins on, 1 min float) while the second 20mins was just constant effort. 

Went well this morning.  Jamie pushed the first couple of efforts on the fartlek then dropped back.  I must have slowed a bit during the fartlek as I did the first full loop in 8:00 and the second in 8:12.  But all up managed 5.84km (3:25's average). 

Felt much more comfortable on the hard effort run (if that's not an oxymoron) running low 3:20's until the 4th km slipped to 3:29 so put a bit more effort in to finish it off.  Ended up with 5.93km (3:23's average).

1km warm up and 4.5km warm down with Macca for 17km all up.  Rock solid training this week and feeling good.

Big news is I have a coach for the first time since my Dad coached me aged 16.  Signed up to RunCrew until Gold Coast Marathon.  So at least I'll have someone to blame if it all goes to crap.

Tommy's stat of the day:

Wednesday MLR

Out with Justin and Dicky for the usual route.  Stiff and sore to start with but gradually eased up - particularly after Dicky set his usual breakneck pace.  All up 17.something km in 1:16 (4:27's).

Nice to get home and have Claudia asking if she could do some run training. Then Kirst arrived back from her PT in a good mood so we went for breaky at Emporio (taking just one kid) and feeling like a normal family for once.

This is Claudie:

HuRTS 14 x 3mins

In the future, they will talk of the 7th April 2015 and those hardy HuRTS few who fronted reps number 12, 13 and 14.  Fifty showed up.  Seven were left standing.  They included Charlie "Warrior" Dalziell, Macca "Hardman" McClarnon, Angus "Knows What it Takes to Run Sub35" Boyd, Tom "TOMTom" Lee and Tom "Leading by Example" Highnam.  And a few others I can't remember.

It was a fine day to start but after about 8 reps someone pointed out the ominous black clouds gathering over Western Sydney.  On rep 12, it hit with the mother of all mini-storms coming over us.  I was running blind with horizontal hailstones coming across and nearly ran into at least 2 or 3 people going the other way.  Of course, at this point those SOBS like CT, Enda, J-Fen et al. had all upped-stumps and headed to the nearest coffee shop for their decaf coconut chai's.

Reps went (distance wise):

850m, 890m, 900m, 900m, 900m, 900m, 920m, 910m, 920m, 920m, 930m, 870m (super cell Cyclone Vinny coming through), 910m and 950m

900m is 3:20's.  920m is 3:15's.  950m is 3:09.

Solid session.  Great to see Wildman back out there.  Tucks and CT putting in last minute sessions before Buffalo Stampede at the weekend.  I don't envy them that.

Warm up and down for 17km all up.  This week will be my biggest of the year yet.

Easter Monday

14km in the late afternoon - 7km up to North head turning around and retracing my steps.  Bit of verbal abuse from Ireland's no.2 Johnny Burke up the hill at Shelley Beach.  But otherwise unremarkable.  60:29 (4:19's).

Easter Sunday Long Run

OK, well I buggered up my clock changing.  We were meeting at 5.30am (which should feel like 6.30am), except I use my phone as a clock and it automatically adjusted for daylight savings changes, so I actually got up at 7am.

Cursed quite a lot for the first 5km, then randomly bumped into Jamie as he was emerging from the path leading to Dee Why Beach.  Massive coincidence really (he'd thought we were meeting at 6.10am aka 7.10am) so we ran together along the normal route in reverse.  The big question was which way around the lake Macca and Justin were going to have gone.  I said Macca would have put 2 and 2 together and avoided the mud on the near side.  Jamie said Justin was a creature of habit and would have insisted on going the near side.  Turns out when we met them that this is exactly the way their conversation had panned out in deciding which way to go!

Ran back and the pace picked up a bit.  Justin peeled off, Macca ran with us half way down Manly Beach then headed home leaving Jamie and I.  By this stage we'd started to chase some old fella running quite quickly down Manly Beach and were running sub4's.  We were both feeling pretty good so just upped the pace from there.  I ended up doing 30km in 2:07:11 (4:14's) with the final 10km in 38:35.

Striders Lane Cove - 5th in 34:33

Was pretty underwhelmed coming into this race.  Weather was crap with teeming rain but more relevantly, I was nervous after feeling so average on Thursday morning not helped by too many beers on Thursday night.  Didn't want my legs to feel so dead again so decided on taking it easy early on then feeling my way into the race.  Did a 4km warm up with Justin, Macca and Dicky in the pitch black.

Lined up a few rows back and set off behind Timmy and LJ feeling pretty comfortable.  Shortened my stride going up Scribbly Gums and found myself in about 8th spot and picking people up as I went.  However, as soon as pushed just a bit too hard the legs felt very average so I figured I was doing the right thing.  1km in 3:25, 2km in 6:54, 3km in 10:34, 4km in 13:57.  Not sure of 5km (it's on the steep hill and I'm concentrating here) but I'd guess 17:40.  From then I could see Robin Vonk, Lewis and Alex R up ahead so concentrated on trying to catch them and worked harder to do so.  Caught Robin at 6km then Lewis at 8km.  Got closish to Alex but he was cruising and upped the pace when he heard my slapping footsteps.  So a good negative split but just need the body to recover and work to calm down.

Nice run by Barts to get close to Dave C but otherwise times were pretty average today.  Timmy won $20 after staying ahead of LJ.  One more months training and she'll have him.  'Lil Jimmy looked resplendent in an England football kit.  Justin and Dicky need to stop running together the whole time.  Macca came home strong picking up a number of places and CT was forced to time trial for 3rd place.  Thank God that's all over.  

Friday Filler

Big night of beers last night first at work after a very challenging week and then in the Woolloomooloo Bay Hotel for the final Biathlon of the season celebrations.  So felt pretty average today.  Got out in the afternoon for 8km feeling better every step I took.  Shelly Beach and back running around Lakeview Crescent at the end to make up the distance.  34:10 (4:16's).  A grey run but what the hell, just running to feel.

108km for the week (largest for a while) but really disappointing sessions.  Not sure why this is - may be the stresses at work.  Will race tomorrow but not sure how I'll play it.  I don't want my legs to feel as they did on Thursday morning.

Beaches Crew 800's

Up bright and early again for 800's along the beach.  Just Jamie, Macca, Amy and Anna this morning, with the 6 x 800's to run off a rolling 4 mins.

I felt crap from the word go.  Just couldn't get the legs moving today, and when I did try to speed up I would start to go lactic.  Reps went 2:35, 2:33, 2:31, 2:32, 2:30, 2:30.  I was pretty much running with Jamie for the first half of each rep then pulling ahead slightly in the 2nd half.  After this mediocre showing I had to do something to make myself feel better so called for two extra 400's.  Ran those in 71s and 68s, feeling marginally better.

Long warm down with Macca, Jamie and Amy for 13km all up and my worst session of the year.

Wednesday MLR

Out early in the dark with Justin and Dicky.  Couldn't find my trainers so had to wear an older pair without orthotics.  Amazing how much lighter and bouncier you feel without them.  But the downside was my achilles was tight even early on.

Honest pace as ever with Dicky leading the way but he turned back at the roundabout up to North Head so Justin and I dropped to a more comfortable pace without him.  17.6km all up - 4:37 pace.

Kirst is on a dairy free, low sugar diet and I discovered this amazing yoghurt that fits the bill.  Seriously, it's nicer than any normal yoghurt I've tasted.  Had a massive dollop on my Weetbix post-run:

And this one's for Timmy - Fog on the Tyne: