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Day 88–A Morning Run Just Before It Got Dark

I think I got about 30 minutes sleep proper before waking at 1am to work on the opening day of practice for the Australian GP. Until around 4am it seemed waking early was a complete waste of time as technical issues meant I was able to do precious little work. Things slowly improved during the course of the morning, but it was a busy old day, not finishing until gone midday.

I slept for around three hours then dozed for another, finally getting out of bed at around 4:15pm. I wasted no time putting on the running kit. The weather outside was a change to recent days, grey and a little dreary, but at least it was dry, if not a little breezy. I left the house just before 5pm and from the first steps it felt every bit like an early morning run. The body and legs tired, not yet woken up, shuffling along with little in the way of pace or intensity.

The first couple of miles were the hardest, mostly uphill to Barrowby and into a headwind. The left hip and inner thigh are quite sore – I’m sure its coming from the back but there are so many tender spots around the back and legs it’s hard to be definite. Once in Barrowby the wind was mostly at my back and I headed down The Drift towards the canal path I last tackled just a couple of days ago. Slowly getting dark, once back in town I was able to make it onto the river path with just enough light to see – the breeze now unkindly back in my face having enjoyed a pick up in pace when it was behind me.

In the last mile the legs were really stiff, suffering the twin pains of lots of miles and nowhere near enough sleep. The customary coughing fit on completion of the run marked the end of a run I could have rather done without, but pleased enough to have force my body out to run it.

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Day 87–So So Tired

This is, by necessity, going to be brief. Two and a half hours sleep before being up at 1am and then working straight through to midday. Four hours at best sleep before some more work and then time to head out for the club run. I was on zombie autopilot.

For all that the legs didn’t feel too bad. The left hip was sore for the solo miles I ran, so before heading a but out I did a little stretching which seemed to help. It was a small group running at the club. The first few miles were actually run at a pace I could have kept with until, with one or two with a half marathon on Sunday, dialled the pace down to a rate that would have me snoozing by the layside if I wasn’t careful.

Along five gates and a strange weather pattern in the still air as we ran through cold and warm packets of air – I don’t think I’ve ever run through air with such a clear temperature difference before. Little things like that were just about keeping me alert, but I was struggling.

At Londonthorpe with the main climb of the run tackled, I said my goodbyes to the group and pushed on alone, the thinking being the sooner I got home the sooner I could get to bed ready for the next night shift. The final miles were fairly hard going with the legs stiffening, but the pace had picked up too to be comfortably under seven minute miles, so hardly suffering too much yet from the lack of sleep.

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Day 86–Better Than Being On A Plane

So the first day proper of Australian GP preparations saw me arise at 3am, catching around three and a half hours sleep before being rudely awoken by the fear of the alarm clock going off rather than the alarm clock itself. A quiet day in Melbourne and here ensued as a fair majority of the F1 media and paddock folk were delayed by five hours when an Emirates flight went technical. The journey from London to Melbourne typically takes 22 or so hours flying alone with 2-3 hours in transit, so add a five hour delay and you have a fairly arduous journey.

It’s little things like this that mean I lose little sleep over no longer being a (very small) part of the traveling F1 circus. It is, for the mind and body, a lot healthier and easier being based at home. I may moan about having to be up for 1am tonight, but at least my journey to work can be measured in footsteps rather than thousands of miles.

After a few hours sleep in the morning and lunch (or was it breakfast, or dinner?) it was time to head out for a run. I’d not much planned other than I wanted to do some decent miles. The weather was simply stunning – after a foggy morning, the cloud had burnt away during the morning to leave blue skies, weak sunshine and barely a wisp of wind. The temperature was around 11C, which was just perfect for running comfortably in. At points on the fields near Belvoir Castle, the mists were just starting to form again. It’s times like these I wish I renewed my habit of taking a camera with me whilst running for such occasions.

I headed in a similar direction to yesterday, this time running past Harlaxton on the A607 and towards Denton. The legs were feeling reasonable, if a little tired – running seven minute miles was comfortable. At Denton I headed towards Harston, the intention to turn off on Woolsthorpe Lane to Woolsthorpe. Not entirely sure where I was going, I went a bit early and turned off on the first road I came to, soon finding myself on a public bridleway. Thankfully although the path was a bit sticky in places and heavily grooved from passing 4x4s it was mostly dry and not too hard for a bad cross country runner to negotiate.

The path spat me out after a mile or so at the top of the Cliff Road – a hill much easier to run down than up – as you do at the Newton’s Fraction Half Marathon, taking place this Sunday. It was here, at eight miles, I just raised the effort a bit, from easy to moderately steady. Heading onto the canal path back to Grantham, I gradually ramped up the effort, taking the pace by the end of the path and into Grantham at approximately marathon pace. It was reasonably hard work but it felt as though I was reaping the benefits of being at the business end of marathon training, despite those little doubts creeping in, thanks largely to not racing for a few weeks, that perhaps I’m losing form.

The run was a bit stop/start as I ran through town and into home. It was there I was reminded I still have the remnants of a cold and cough and possibly in the throws of catching another one. Every time I stopped, the cough began, and when I stopped for the final time, after 15.3 miles, the coughing fit persisted for several minutes. My neighbours have already commented that all this running lark cannot be good for you if you sound this dreadful at the end of a run. Hopefully the results over the coming weeks will prove them wrong.

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Day 85–Making The Most Of The Blue Sky

With full blown coverage of the Australian GP starting early tomorrow morning, I’d little intention of running in the evening. Some impromptu middle of the night work from Melbourne meant a little longer than planned spent in bed, once I’d finally got back to sleep. All in all I must have had around six and a half hours of sleep, split into chunks. How would that treat the legs, which had run 24 miles on the Monday?

With the sun shining, I decided to go for an easy paced extended recovery run, making up for the lack of blue sky running on the Sunday. The first mile was the slowest, but straight away the legs felt better than at any point on yesterday’s run. The cough and cold is still in the system, but a lot less so than yesterday. After three miles or so I was easily bouncing along, feeling I could’ve gone plenty quicker should I wanted or needed to.

Through Harlaxton and up the appropriately named Swine Hill, it was probably the easiest I’d ever felt tackling this pretty steep climb, a feeling justified with a check on the Strava segments, which showed it to be my fastest ascent, and just a little way behind the newly crowned king of this mountain.

Once past the hill, the run pleasingly winds, mostly gently downhill, all the way back to Grantham, through Sproxton and towards Little Ponton. In spite of running into a headwind, the mile splits were comfortably under seven minutes. Into Grantham and along the river path back to home, the pace remained much the same and continued to feel very comfortable. The body was certainly enjoying the sunshine, although the left hip did start to grumble in the final couple of miles.

With night shifts awaiting, who knows how I’ll wing the rest of the week in terms of running. It will likely be a heavy dose of hazy minded easy paced running, with hopefully one quick session thrown in if I am lucky.

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Day 84–The Long One Done–Eventually

The 24 mile run has been, for the past nine years or so, my longest pre-marathon training run. Back in Coventry I had a four lap loop of around six miles that I ran in alternate clockwise, anticlockwise directions. Sounds boring, but I liked it for some reason, not least of which because I was able to call home should anything untoward occur.

Last year I was with my brother for the 24 miler. Actually I should have completed the 24 mile run a week earlier over Easter in Boston, but a combination of injuries and a vicious headwind meant I could only muster 22 miles. A week later at my brother’s house and injuries still putting major doubts on my ability to run, we concocted a three pronged route of eight or so miles per on different out and back loops. Although I remember being able to pick the pace up a bit in the final miles, it was by no means the swiftest run I’ve ever done – taking three hours ten minutes to cover the 24.29 miles at an average pace of 7:49 per mile.

This year and the 24 mile run was scheduled for yesterday (Sunday), a week earlier than I would have liked, but work has dictated this is my last weekend I can guarantee fitting in a long run. As chance would have it my brother and his family was at my home this year, although he would not be running with me. And as it transpired, nor would I. The cold that came on late Friday, really kicked in after my short run on Saturday. The legs felt like jelly, the head like it was going to explode. I went through the motions of running as planned on the Sunday, forsaking the Indian meal for something more gastronomically more suitable for a long run, but by around 8pm I knew a run was very unlikely and tucked into a glass or three of champagne and other (nicer) varieties of sparkling wine.

Sunday was indeed a write-off. Heading out for a morning walk to the park with the kids in tow on a glorious spring day, I felt like I could run 2-3 miles max. I improved a little during the day, but ultimately felt comfortable, but frustrated, in my decision not to run.

Fortunately I had Monday as an alternate date for the 24 mile run. I woke a little groggy and stiff, but much better than I felt a day earlier. After a quick breakfast and some pfaffing I was ready to head out. A 24 mile run had been mapped out and I was heading out with the old faithful Garmin 305, the new 910XT stubbornly refusing to accept the course thanks to some continued issues with the Garmin Connect site.

Where yesterday was wall to wall blue skies and temperatures in the high teens, this morning was cloudy, with a cold breeze and temperatures struggling to reach double digits. Whilst this would make the run easier and more comfortable, it was again a bit frustrating as a warm weather run would have been good preparation should race day turn out to be a scorcher. Chilly and stiff, the first couple of miles were fairly torrid. I briefly wondered whether I should continue. Thankfully the legs improved a bit and I pushed on, the biggest limiter being the headwind I was running into for much of the first half of the run.

The biggest challenge in the opening half of the run was the hill on the approach to Hough on the Hill. The legs felt dreadful going up. As seems to happen though the agony of the climb appeared to kick start the body, as the next mile was the first to dip under seven minutes. After a long descent there was a string of flat to gently rolling miles I’ve not run on before which passed by fairly quickly, all run around or just under seven minutes per mile. I felt better than I did at the start of the run but not feeling fantastic. It was as though the body was going through the motions rather than actively engaging in the run. Apart from the general feeling of malaise, the only issue was a niggling left hip, the source of pain from which could be coming from any of the usual suspects – back, IT band, hamstrings quads etc..

At sixteen miles I joined a brief bridleway that led to a quiet lane which I ran back last October when I ran a breakthrough long run, in biblically wet conditions, at an average of under 6:40 per mile. I wasn’t running at that pace but at least I was feeling fairly comfortable and the dry conditions were far nicer than the torrential downpour I encountered that Saturday afternoon.

Not long after passing through Foston, I had the A1 to cross. This motorway in all but name is not the sort of road you want to put all your faith in weary legs that have covered 18 miles, but that’s what I had to do, as a safe gap in the traffic is hard to find. That hazard successfully tackled and it was back on with the run. By and large the run was 90% traffic free, a real boon of running in this area. On this road off the A1 I was passed by the largest motorhome I’ve ever seen, one so big it made the BMW X5 it was towing behind look like a Smart car. Thankfully there was nothing coming the other way so it was able to pass relatively safely.

These distractions were putting off the inevitable sting in this long run’s tail. At 21 miles, after crossing the A1 again – this time more comfortably thanks to a bridge – there was the small matter of Newark Hill to tackle. At three quarters of a mile long and averaging nearly six per cent it is something of a challenge in a car let alone running up it. I found a pace and stuck at it, thankfully this proved quite successful, except for some problems at the lower end of the left IT band which made my running stride feel quite unusual.

The hill tackled it was a couple of miles back to home. After the descent from Great Gonerby, which was nearly as painful on the quads as the ascent, I was pleased that the final mile, mostly flat, was the quickest mile of the run. It wasn’t blistering and nowhere near what I want to be running in the marathon, but it showed there was still some energy still in the body. When the run finished the inevitable coughing fit ensued, 24 miles taking its toll on lungs full of cold.

At 2h50min the run is hopefully somewhat longer in terms of time than I will run in just under five weeks time. Hopefully I will have better health and be free of the niggles in the left leg. As it is it was the second quickest 24 mile training run I’ve done, the 2010 edition was slightly quicker. Back then I was in half marathon PB shape and was in good health for the run. That today’s run was only marginally slower and I was only feeling around 60% should bode well.

Split Summary
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1) 1m – 7:45(7:45/m) 128/136bpm 124cal
2) 1m – 7:34(7:34/m) 136/142bpm 124cal
3) 1m – 7:16(7:16/m) 143/151bpm 124cal
4) 1m – 7:15(7:15/m) 141/148bpm 124cal
5) 1m – 7:15(7:15/m) 142/149bpm 124cal
6) 1m – 7:18(7:18/m) 143/147bpm 121cal
7) 1m – 7:26(7:26/m) 147/161bpm 126cal
8) 1m – 6:59(6:59/m) 141/148bpm 123cal
9) 1m – 6:48(6:48/m) 137/141bpm 125cal
10) 1m – 6:59(6:59/m) 142/144bpm 123cal
11) 1m – 6:59(6:59/m) 141/145bpm 125cal
12) 1m – 6:59(6:59/m) 143/146bpm 124cal
13) 1m – 6:54(6:54/m) 142/147bpm 124cal
14) 1m – 7:01(7:01/m) 143/147bpm 124cal
15) 1m – 6:49(6:49/m) 141/147bpm 124cal
16) 1m – 6:55(6:55/m) 143/148bpm 126cal
17) 1m – 7:02(7:02/m) 141/145bpm 121cal
18) 1m – 7:00(7:00/m) 142/146bpm 124cal
19) 1m – 7:06(7:06/m) 143/151bpm 125cal
20) 1m – 6:59(6:59/m) 142/145bpm 124cal
21) 1m – 7:03(7:03/m) 145/150bpm 122cal
22) 1m – 7:19(7:19/m) 148/158bpm 123cal
23) 1m – 6:59(6:59/m) 147/157bpm 122cal
24) 1m – 6:38(6:38/m) 147/153bpm 124cal
25) 0.07m – 30(6:46/m) 151/152bpm 9cal