Healing and Lazing

It has been a quiet few days here at Tinpot towers. After the Half Marathon I intentionally took the week off to allow for my huge blister to heal. Its all fixed now, so there is no reason for why training hasn't begun again.

Apart from it been a week of illness and busyness, so training has taken a back seat. However next week, back in action.

Review of the week 9th February and plans for w/c 16th February

It seems like it's been a long time since I have posted any update on training, but after my week off mentioned in my last post I was raring to go come Monday 9th.
However, my enthusiasm was short lived as I completely forgot that this week was parents evening week which effectively wiped out two days of training opportunities. So this is how the week panned out:

Monday 9th - The first of two parents evenings, so after a late finish I really didn't have the motivation to go training.....so I didn't.

Tuesday 10th - A better day. A good 1 hour session of high intensity cardio at the gym, which felt great, as this was my first attempt at exercise in over a week.

Wednesday 11th - The plan was to go to swim coaching straight after parents evening 2. However after an even later finish I was back and forth on whether to go.  I went back. Home. And had a curry. Good times!

Thursday 12th - Nothing! However this was a very exciting day. This was the day my amazing wife ordered my brand new road bike for my upcoming birthday! Very excited and will write more about that when it arrives.

Friday 13th - A nice 6am run to start the day. I covered 8km at a fairly decent pace. It felt good to get running again.

Saturday 14th - Headed to the pool for an early morning swim. The aim was to cover a mile. I managed this in 49 minutes but with stops. Not a great time if I were to do the Ironman today, but with over a year to go, its not a bad start.

Sunday 15th - Back to the gym today. I started with 20 minutes of sprint intervals, with speeds changing from 10kph to 17kph every minute. This was followed but high intensity cardio and bodyweight workouts.

So the week ended better than it started. I've missed the last two weeks of swim coaching which I am not happy about so I am really looking forward to getting back to it next week and with it being half term, there is no excuse.

Plan for next week is as follows:

Monday - 7 mile run. (Already done as I am posting this on Tuesday)

Tuesday - Didn't do anything today as my family and I went fossil hunting along the Jurassic Coast which was awesome. More about that later.

Wednesday - Swim coaching.

Thursday - Maiden bike voyage. Damn excited about this one.

Friday - Swim

Sat - Run (8 mile target)

Sunday -  ??? Going to watch a rugby match on Saturday evening so not holding out much hope for Sunday.

Looking forward to this week.  Watch this space for a bike review!

15th February: Liversedge Half Marathon

The Place: Liversedge, 11am, 15th Feb 2015

The Organisers: Robert Town Road Runners

The Distance: Half Marathon (13.1 miles)

Beforehand: I  know nothing about Liversedge, I'm sorry to say. I signed up for this as the weekend I had planned to do a half was unavailable. Liversedge is about an hours drive from my house in Sheffield. I'm fairly confident about this distance. I'm not looking to break records, just finish. I've made the decision to head out the night before for a few waters with some friends, although knowing me that will develop into something other than water.

Prediction: Sub 2 hrs 30

The Day: Well what do you know if developed into cocktails and dancing. Its a good job I know myself, so I interspersed booze with soft drinks. I woke up clear headed with a huge amount of Fog covering Sheffield. Definitely not weather that you want to head out in, but I'd curtailed my Fred Astaire like moves the night before and if I didn't go, then that would have been for nothing. So dragging myself out of bed, I pulled on my running tights, shorts and a long sleeved running top, before remembering to plaster the old nips. That is very important for long distance races, I sense a future uncomfortable post about that.

Getting to Liversedge ,or  I suppose to be technical Roberttown, was not difficult at all. A quick nip up the motorway and then some nice country roads. I had however neglected to realise what a popular race this was and had to park a good half a mile away from the start. Not too bad when you're starting but so far when you are finished. And once again after Cardiff Half, I made sure to park my car right by where I'd be running at the 12.5 mile mark, just to add a extra frisson of self control for the end.  Fortunately this time I didn't notice it, as I was in full on push to the end mode.

The registration, chip and number collection was in the church hall and went off without a hitch. I struggled to get my timing chip attached to my shoes, but that had nothing to do with the chip.

I ambled out into the cold, again and once again thought of another fine mess I'd got myself into. There was some warms up aerobics going on by the start but I didn't want to waste energy on that. I had 13.1 miles to warm up over.

The gun went off and all 600 of us begun. And oh the hills, so many hills. The entire first mile was down hill, which is nice to start but then you realise its a circular course. What goes down, must trudge up.

I've not been able to find a profile for this year's but last years looks pretty similar. (Thank you to @halfmarathonmad for the photo). As you can see lots of big drops then lots of climbs. I believe it was on the second big drop that someone raced passed me, making worried noises as he seemed to be out of control. I'd hope to give you a mile by mile account but its all a bit of a blur.

 I'll be honest with you I may have walked up some of the later hills, at least partly. However I ran the 1st 8 Miles in 75 minutes, according to the marshalls who I kept using for time checks. I find not havine a watch with me helps as I have to listen to my body rather than a ticking clock and  it also gives me an excuse for a quick chat with another person.

Towards the end I was spent, I was so tired, as I had had no idea of the hilliness of the course before starting. I'd not looked at the course, figuring each Half will be fairly similar to the last. Alas, twas not so. This was much more challenging course than any I've done before, still hopefully good practice for Sheffield Half in a few months.

I finally finished and well it was  A PERSONAL BEST. Somehow despite the hills and the odd bit of walking I had trounced my previous best time. I even managed a sprint finish, just to overtake the lady in front who'd I'd been trailing for miles. So I finished with a chip time of 2 hours 12 minuts 18 seconds and 2 miliseconds.

I got a so delicious bottle of water and a long sleeved tshirt, as shown below. Not the most amount of swag ever but for a smallish locally organised event more than enough.

Thank you Roberttown Road runners for organising this. I may well be back next year, if I can stomach the hills again.

Pros: Well organised, Friendly, Easy to get to

Cons: Hills,Hills,Hills

Blisters: Yep

Results:

2 hrs 12 mins 18 Secs - NEW PB

Equipment Review: Ipod Shuffle

An essential part of my gym sessions is my Ipod Shuffle. Its got a handy clip which attachs easily to my shorts, and when I'm a bit heavier digs into my stomach, sometimes cutting me. But its a good way to know when you've not been going to the gym enough.

If you're an itune user its great, however recently I've found itunes becoming more and more unwieldy. Battery life is long enough, I think about 8 hours at first although this does decrease after time.

I'm actually on my second Shuffle, my 1st was a 1gb Blue one like in the photo above in March 2009. If you look at our race histroy page, you'll see I did quite a bit of training in that time and eventually just before my 2nd Marathon in September 2012, it died. It would no longer hold a charge. So I replaced it with a 2gb orange one. This is still going strong.

Before that the headphones has died in December 2011, so I got these.

They were brilliant and I'd highly recommend them. They fit snugly on the ear and sound good. It did take me a while to figure out how to get them on easily, but that's probably just me. However they have now broke, only the right ear works. Still they have done me well, and I'd consider getting them again. However I have no moved onto a waterproof walkman, that as I type I'm trying to setup. I'll let oyu know how it pans out.

Here's a quick rundown of some of  the songs I have to have on my running playlist. They all have a fast beat and are great to get your heart pumping, or at least mine. 

Girls Aloud-Megamix

                         

N.E.R.D - Rockstar

                            

A+D-Love Will Tear You Apart

                         

These are the tracks which kick me into high gear. But I'm always looking for more. Add your suggestions to the comments.

Excuses or Week Ending 8th February

I think that on the left just about sums it up. This week I just didn't do it and all I have are excuses. Its so bad I'm writing this Thursday night knowing full well I'm not getting anything done between here and Sunday evening.

All I did was a quick 2 mile run on Tuesday, as my mood was foul and I need some endorphins. I could give you the excuses but what's the point? I just didn't do it. That's the main way of getting there with this, the only way getting out there and doing the reps.

Anyway no point in looking back and moping, let's look forward.

I have been trying to build up to the Wrexham Marathon, but budgetary constraints mean I won't be going anymore. (Look out for the change to a shameful Did Not Start DNS on the race page). However this does mean I can change my focus onto the Sheffield Half Marathon, which is 9 weeks away. However before that I've the Liversedge Half Marathon on the 15th of February, so I suppose I better taper this week. Does that even work after a week off? Once again to my trusty friend Mr. Hal Higdon

Monday: Squash - That counts as stretch and strengthen
Tuesday:  4 mile on hills
Wednesday: 3 mile run
Thursday: 2m
Friday: Nowt
Satuday: Nowt
Sunday: Half Marathon then Beer Tasting

And then maybe next week I'll start at week 4 of Half Marathon Novice 2.

Oh No, H20!

Which one is me? Which is Dan?

So far I haven't covered swimming very much on this blog and that's because I haven't done any yet. I'm not sure if its the cold weather or the fact I can't find practically indecent racing shorts or some other reason but I just haven't been yet.

I love swimming, although I'm not particularly good at it. Its this cut off of the 3 disciplines at Ironman Wales that I'm most concerned about. You need to be on your 2nd lap after 1hr15 minutes. Each lap is 1.9k, (then a K run in between, sheer lunacy). So the 1st lap needs to be done at a speed of 25.33 metres a minute. Now I put it like that, its not too bad. I think last time I checked I was doing about 25 metres in about 35 seconds, without too much of a push. And its been so long I've no idea what stroke that is with. I tend to favour Breaststroke but then Crawl does seem more sensible for the whole endeavour.

I'm tempted to start having lessons like Dan but the inflexibilty. I also need to get some experience in open water and especially sea swimming. So if anyone knows of any good places to swim in the sea or sea based races (Preferably somewhere near very landlocked Sheffield), let me know in the comments.

The swim is where I'm planning to use the arms most. Everything will be involved in every part of the race but my arms will be taking less of a battering on the cycle and run so let's use them as much as possible in the swim.

I am every so slightly terrified of the mass wave start, I've visions of it degenerating into this

Okay prehaps not that bad, but I have heard horror stories of getting a good clonk from another over enthusiastic competitor. So the plan is to stay wide, and closeish to the back. Anytime lost can be more easily made up on a later discipline.

Hopefully after these next two half marathons, I'll find my fish legs again. Also I still need to try out my Waterproof MP3 player and get it to stay in my ears.

Review of the week and the week ahead (Late again!)

Bad Times

After a slow start last week due to a sickness bug, I got back to training on the Wednesday, 28th January, with swim coaching. This was a really good session and it felt great getting back into it.

Thursday I was intending to go to the gym but this didn't happen. Poor effort!

Friday I headed back to the pool and swam for 1.1km which wasn't too bad. I went in the fast lane and managed to keep up with some fairly competent swimmers so I was happy with that. Improvements definitely being made.

Saturday 31st January I went for an early morning run in Tenby. I ran a very hilly route which was challenging but I managed to cover 7 miles and seeing as I was suffering from a bad cold at the time, I was happy with this.

Saturday night was the night of a surprise birthday party I organised for my wife, Lucie. It was an awesome night apart from me making a complete arse of myself! (Apologies to all)
However, a top night out usually means the following day is a write-off, and boy was it a write-off!
Sunday I felt extremely rough but this then developed into quite flu like symptoms (in hindsight, running with a cold was probably not a good idea).

So far this week I have not been feeling well at all. Although on the mend now, I have decided not to partake in any training this week and start a fresh on Monday when hopefully all bloody colds, sickness bugs and general roughness has passed. I'm not happy with not training but doing so would probably make matters worse at the moment.

So, not a good week. Roll on Monday!

Week in Review: Week Ending 1st February

I should probably just get a template for these posts stating something like "Aimed to high, trained too little". So let's just take it as read that I didn't manage the early morning stuff, the long run, the swim or anything on Thursday. Wow, that was a terrible week for training, although excellent in many other ways.

Adding to the guilt is that I got back from a very fun weekend in Tenby to find a new copy of 220 Triathlon sitting on the doormat waiting to be read.  Its got a great 2015 race guide in there so may start looking at the options for the year ahead.

Also I may not be doing the Wrexham Marathon now. After the suspension snapping on the car on Friday night, I don't know if I can afford the hotel and train to get there. (I'd drive but since I fell asleep into a burger after my 1st Marathon, that doesn't sound too wise). Its still a month away so not making a decision right now but just throwing it out there. Give me any thoughts in the comments.

For Going - I've already paid, I've said I will
Against Going - Spending Money can't really afford, I'm not ready To be honest

But before I decide on that, its time for looking to next week.

Monday: 5 Mile Run
Tuesday: 5 Mile Run
Wednesday: 8 Mile Run
Thursday: Swimming, as may finally have worked out how to keep my waterproof MP3 player in my ears by then
Friday: Nowt
Weekend: Also Nowt as I've a big leaving do to go to.

See look at that managing expectations.