Thursday, February 26, 2009

Green Bridge Loop

Tues PM - 30 mins easy

Wed AM - 90 mins, 19k's @ 4:36 mins/km


Green Bridge Loop with Glenda, Matt L, Wayne and Gaz. Was a little bit tired in the first 20 minutes, but felt great in the last 20 minutes.

Wed PM - 30 mins very easy

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

A pleasant surprise

Sun AM - 120 mins, 24ks @ about 4:50 mins/km

Solid long run with Pete, Wayne and Mike H covering the Green Bridge loop and then finishing the last half hour by myself.

Sun PM - 30 mins

Slow trot around Wavell Heights with MJ. Tallied up 65ks with six runs in four days after getting over the stomach virus.

Tues AM - 2 mins, 30JR, 1min, 30JR, 2mins, 60SR. Repeat. 30 second efforts, one hill.

Showed my face at PCRG for only the second time in five and a half weeks! Had done some glute firing exercises and strides on the street in front of my house at 9pm last night so was quietly confident I had my mojo back. Started out a little conservatively but after five minutes I felt great and then cut loose, finishing level with Andy at the halfway mark. Finished strongly and kept the momentum going through the 30 second efforts and then was sold a dummy by Glenda who told me we had to finish with a hill rep. I smashed myself up the grass hill, pleased that I was well clear of everyone else only to turn around and find that the session had ended and I was alone on top of the hill. Oh, well - a little extra work never hurt anyone. Pleasantly surprised with how I went today - I knew I still had my fitness, but thought I might have lost a few yards of pace but I have lost very little speed over the last five weeks. Next Tuesday's time trial will tell me a lot more.

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Road block

THE BAD NEWS - I have only done one of a possible nine speedwork sessions in the last four and a half weeks due to a mystery virus that has sapped me of the strength to run at full speed and on bad days has sapped me of the strength to run at even 4:20's. My plans to return to speedwork on Tuesday were thwarted by contracting a stomach virus from MJ despite staying away from her and sleeping on the floor of the rumpus room for three nights!!! I went 30 hours without food and was over the worst of it within 40 hours and was back on the road this morning for an easy 40 mins.

THE GOOD NEWS - Despite this being the worst four week period I have had health wise since May, 2006, I have still managed to rack up 78,79,80 and 70k's per week for the last four weeks!!! That is more mileage than I was doing in a good week as little as 12-18 months ago so I'm confident I've lost very little fitness. Hopefully my immune system is now ready for the rigours of the 4.5 months leading up to the Gold Coast Marathon.

Sunday, February 01, 2009

Fortnight of frustration

A cold I contracted on Sat 17th has proven a real nuisance. Whilst, I was was over the worst of the cold within 48 hours and missed only one day of work, I have yet to regain full strength. That week, I ripped into a can of "Harden Up" and slogged my way through 78k's of low intensity training, skipping both speedwork sessions. Wednesday, I was dropped by the Group after just 20 minutes and on Sunday I was only just able to keep contact with the Group for the first ninety minutes before finishing reasonably well.

This week, I attempted a return to speedwork on Tuesday when we did 8 x 1 mins in the Gardens. Right from the start, I was sluggish and off the pace - it felt like each of my legs had been injected with three litres of water that was weighing them down. I was breathing ok but had no strength and watched as Nic, Andy and Glenda raced away from me. Any thoughts that I was imagining things were disproved when I was only capable of doing half of my normal pushups back at the Ship Inn.

Wednesday, I held on for a little longer before being dropped by Glenda after 32 minutes and the rest of the week I just ran low intensity mileage recording 79k's for the week and skipping speedwork on Friday. Most of the runs the last fortnight, I didn't want to be running at all, which is unusual for me but I thought of my goals and laced up the Brooks anyway.

As I type, there has been no improvement in my strength and I will not be running the time trial or speedwork this week. It'll be another week of 8-10 hour sleeps, scoffing vitamins and OJ, avoiding alcohol and minimising dairy. I'm pretty sure that continuing to train at low intensity is not delaying my recovery and I'll just have to wait until the tide turns. I'm too scared to take a break and lose fitness anyway.