Tipping away, tipping away....

Week beginning the 7^th April

Spent Monday afternoon scanning the web for the results of the Connemara ultra. I am really thinking about doing this beast of a race next year. In fact ultras have always been a source of interest to me since I started running marathons 3 years ago. Usually my  response to stories of runners tackling Connemara 39.3, Dingle 50 mile or the Connemara 100 miler is a mixture of awe and “are they mad”. Anyway I was delighted to see a Mallow runner, Adrian Ryder, complete the Connemara ultra in under 6 hrs, a benchmark of some achievement. Congrats also to Barry from Kilkenny (a fellow dailymile.com member) for also completing the distance. Adrian is looking to go sub 3.30 in Cork marathon- shouldn’t be a problem for him especially with such a good base built up.

Walked 4 miles in the evening. Easy enough and on Tuesday ran 8 miles with a 2 mile warmup, a 5 mile tempo and 1 mile cooldown. I ran the same tempo two weeks ago and did so in a 7.05 average with a average HR of 161 . Remarkably I ran the same tempo in the same average pace though the splits were different. Today’s splits were 7.13 (blustery wind), 7.05, 7.08, 7.00 and 6.59. I was happy enough as last summer  I could only run these tempos in a 7.13 average so there is a definite improvement. Now if I could only translate that form in a race. Wednesday the plan was to run 10 miles “strong” which meant sub 8 pace. The workout went very well. First mile was uphill and slow – 8.27 but by mile 3 was getting faster despite the strong headwind. Doing 3 fast laps (1.5 miles in total) around the town park played it’s part. By mile 6 I was flying and the last 2 miles on the Cork road and up Newline and through town were my fastest. Splits were as follows 1) 8.27 2) 7.52 3) 8.02 4) 7.47 5) 7.49 6) 7.48 7) 7.35 8) 7.37 9) 7.22 10) 6.51 . This was a very good run all done in 1.17.16. HR was 156. Average pace 7.45. I could have ran for another couple of miles – no doubt about it.

Thursday morning. Up and out the door at 6.55 am for a 8 mile session before i headed to work. I had some intervals in mind but the legs over the first mile (8.41) weren’t up for it so I decided to run a 5 mile tempo at a pace somewhere between marathon and half marathon pace. V happy with the 5 miles 7.50 (Hr 164),7.48 (hr 158),7.32 (HR 165),7.30(Hr 165) ,7.31(HR 164). Last two miles were at cooldown jogging pace but I had enough at that stage as had my legs. Last two miles were completed in 8.13 and 8.24. The high HR over the tempo portion a indicator of rest needed over next couple of days. 8 miles  in 1.03.33 at 7.57 pace.

Saturday was the morning of the 20 long run. Normally I run these on a Sunday but I had a function to attend Saturday night so I thought it was safer to get it out of the way otherwise I would be shattered on Sunday morning. My wife was driving up to Cork on the morning anyway so I thought I could kill a number of birds with one stone by going up on a Saturday (visiting my mum and getting a good lunch being one of them !!!). Anyway the plan was simple enough jog a warmup mile around the estate up in Mayfield and then onto Banduff, Ballyvolane, Spring lane, Mallow road, Commons road, Blackpool (past my Dad’s house),Kryl’s Quay, Sundays Well, out and back on the Lee road, Carrigarohane, turn off up towards Model farm road, back towards the Millrace  and then back home up Pope’s Quay, Wellington Road and Montenotte. It was a dog of a route truth be known. The wind and rain lashed down all the way and I had decided to keep the pace relative to the heart rate. In other words keep the HR around 140 and see what kind of pace I would manage. Up to mile 19 I was tipping away but the hill by the Montenotte hill flattened me. That last minute took 10minutes16 seconds. As I said it was a dog of a route, more suited to Connemara than Cork. I was a bit disappointed with the slow average pace (9.13) but happy with the (HR 140-142). The whole run lasted 3hrs04mins30 seconds which of course was the point of the exercise – time on the feet but the wind and rain didn’t help me at all.

Plans are taking shape for the next few weeks. Wexford half marathon is on next Sunday week with a weekly target of 45-50 miles. The week after that the long run will be another slow effort with a plan of 55 weekly miles and a 22 mile run. I have a idea of what I want to do for the next 3 weeks after that before the taper but we will talk about that closer the time. The next 4 weeks are make and break. When I start hitting 20 miles on the weekend then the real training begins...

50 miles this week (4, 8,10,8,20)