Illness continues

Quick Monday update - sinus continues with the added bonus of a sore throat. I have practically no voice (doubtless a relief to my workmates), but surprisingly don't actually feel too bad once I'm up on my feet and start moving around.

I was tempted to take the day off, but have Thursday and Friday of this week, plus Monday and Tuesday of next week, on leave, so decided to come in and make everyone else miserable. What a guy!

Sick again

As mentioned yesterday, I suspected I was coming down with a cold. And so it was proven, with a painful sinus and headache.

Called SW at about 7:15am to tell him I wouldn't be at Wanda Sandhills. He told me to can the weekend, and maybe go for an easy long run tomorrow if I felt up to it.

Stupid body.

30 min easy

Date: Fri, Oct 23(5:50pm)
Conditions: Mild and quite humid, breezy
Location: Bedlam Bay oval
Session: 30 mins easy - felt like 5k
Sleep: Just over 6 hours, good quality. But not enough.
Feeling: Tired, legs pretty weak. Better after lunchtime gym core session.

Didn't get to bed until just after midnight - totally worth it, though, the concert was brilliant. No chance of getting up to get my run in, and didn't even bother. Got home and schlepped around the Bedlam Bay oval for 30 mins. Legs felt pretty ordinary, and had some pretty weird spasms.

Oh yeah - think I'm coming down with a cold. Again. Pardon my french, but.....furckoat.

5 x 1km

Date: Thu, Oct 22 (12:30pm)
Conditions: Mild and quite humid, breezy
Location: Gore Hill Oval, St Leonards
Session: 5 x 1km, 2:30 active recovery (was 3 in the diary, but eh), 3:26 (!), 3:38, 3:46, 3:44, 3:37
Sleep: 7 1/4 hours, pretty reasonable although I failed to get up for the morning Timbrell Park intervals.
Feeling: Bit tired but okay. Some residual stiffness in the legs

Got home later than expected from the motorshow on Wed night so set myself up to fail to arise when the alarm went to head over to Timbrell. Got hold of silver fox to hook up for 1k intervals at the Gore Hill oval, in front of the RNS, and we met up at about 12:30pm.

Two lap warm up was a bit shorter than normal. Into the first rep, and I thought we were a bit hot - so it proved with a 3:26. Paid for this through the rest of the session, with the times a bit all over the shop. Got a half-decent on in on the last where I ran with silver fox, who comprehensively hosed me - he'll make some comment about running the inside track but he was quicker, no doubt about it. Surface is a good one for intervals - uneven enough to provide good training, but not so much as to potentially cause injury. It was pretty heavy underfoot.

Still, good to get it done. Fact is, not so long ago, in the same circumstances I would simply have missed that session.

Cheers, silver fox!

90 mins

Date: Wed, Oct 21 (5:50am)
Conditions: Cool and still, humidity rising as sun rose
Location: Lane Cove National Park - 2 x the Striders 10k course
Session: 90 mins - ran 91:25 for 20km
Sleep: 7 hours. Bit scratchy initially, slept well between 1 and 5:15.
Feeling: Felt tired and stiff.

Up early to get through my 90 minute session. Pretty gleepy on getting up, and on the walk from the car to the start felt pretty stiff. Took about 2-3k to get moving properly, but mentally kept pushing. Probably ran a 1 minute negative split for the two ten k's, with a reasonably solid push from the Lane Cove Road turnaround to bring it home. Positive session.

2 x 800, 2 x 600, 5 x 400

Date: Tue, Oct 20 (6:30pm)
Conditions: Cool and breezy
Location: ES Marks
Session: 2 x 800 (2:50, 2:46), 2 x 600 (2:00,1:56 - I think), 5 x 400 (76,80,77,77,76)
Sleep: 8 hours. Bit scratchy initially, slept well between 1 and 6.
Feeling: Bit stiff in the legs, which actually seemed worse after lunch - I went to the gym and gave them a bit of a stretch, along with some swiss ball work. Traditional post-lunch dip.

Didn't feel great through the warm-up after I got to ES Marks, quite leaden-legged, and was much the same through the drills. Once rolling into the reps I seemed to come reasonably good, almost able to 'run around' the tiredness, and finished off reasonably well, Sam again keeping me pretty honest. Felt better in the legs after the session than I did at the start.

Gets a little awkward the next couple of days - I have to do my 90 minutes in the morning tomorrow (off to the motor show in the evening), and my 1k repeats on Thursday morning (we're seeing The Eels at Luna Park in the evening), so some pretty tough starts. Oh well, so be it.

60 mins, 7 x 100

Date: Mon, Oct 19 (5:45pm)
Conditions: Cool and breezy
Location: Gladesville, Hunters Hill, Woolwich, Tarban Creek Reserve
Session: 60 mins for about 13.4km. 7 x 100m (19,18,18,17,18,18,18)
Sleep: 8 hours. Good quality.
Feeling: Fine. First caffeine free day for a while - felt a bit dopey after lunch but otherwise fine. Felt solid through the run and pretty strong, although first two 100 metre reps were a bit junky.

Just got out for an hour on getting home from work. No sign of the word 'easy' in the schedule so into 'push it along' mode. As mentioned felt pretty strong through the run, with pace under 4:30 per km.

The extra 10 minutes did tell in the 100 metre repeats, thought - the first two were distinctly wobbly. Worth noting that most of the reps were around 17.6. Beautiful setting, though, the full moon sitting just over Lane Cove to the north east providing a lovely soft light over the reserve.

SMC 5k

Date: Sun, Oct 18 (7:00am onwards)
Conditions: Mild and humid, periodic sun breaks
Location: Sydney Marathon Clinic, Smithfield/Wetherill Park
Session: 16 minute warm up (guessing 3.2-3.4km), 5km race 18:03, 10km 44:32. Was supposed to be 2 hours. Oh well.
Sleep: 6 hours. Scratchy early, fine later.
Feeling: Pretty good. A little lower leg soreness that went away after the warm up, no effects from Wanda yesterday morning.

Out to Smiffo for the 5k race. After chatting to the 21k guys, got through a reasonable warm up and felt pretty reasonable at the startline. Target was around 18 mins, if not better.

John Dawlings pointed out one of his fellow Woodstockers and said he was around 18 mins as well and said I might be up for a race. Great, another pirahna in the tank!

I wasn't overly concerned about Gary from the previous month as I felt I'd had a pretty solid couple of weeks and my speed was coming back. There seemed to be a few more quicker kids this month, though.

We started and sure enough Gary bolted along with the pack of kids, the Woodstocker (Dave?) going with them. I hung back, knowing the climb of the first kilometre was a good opportunity to burn some bikkies too early. I picked Gary up within the first five hundred metres, and set to work tracking down Dave. The kids, five of them, had bolted.

I drew even with Dave at about the 1km mark and eased past him down the short little downhill section there, and concentrated on form and making good speed down the hills past the busway.

Hit the turnaround at about 19ish (I forgot to check the watch, only seeing it a bit afterwards) just behind Uncle Dave who was doing the 10km and saw I'd drawn a reasonable lead on Dave. I felt pretty solid and discounted him coming back at me, setting my sights on one of the kids, in an orange singlet, who had fallen out of the pack in front. I thought I was half a chance, until about 500 metres from the finish, where I realised he'd picked up and put some distance into me, and I would have to be happy with where I was placed. Sixth outright in 18:03 and another age group win. Winner did 16:58.

Would have been nice to be sub 18 but the time is about where I think I am at the moment. The kids up the front are running the kind of 5k times I need to be doing, so they're going to be both a good target and a good yardstick in the coming months. I'm convinced that if I can get up close to them, it'll be worth 10-20 seconds getting dragged along. This has given fresh motivation to really go after speedwork, so that's a good thing.

Got out straight after the 5km to run another 10k, following the SMC 10k course. Ran a solid 44:32 with a 2 minute negative split (I was dogging it over the first kilometre) and amused myself running down guys in the middle of the half marathon field. Sorry if that seemed cruel, but it's not the most interesting of courses and I really didn't want to plod out the extra distance at 5 min per km. I think I might have picked up Johnny Dark in my wake.

So, now I know roughly where I am. Bit of work between now and the Striders 10k in three weeks time and I should be sub 37 again, and then onwards to the Central Coast half.

Wanda Sandhills

Date: Sat, Oct 15 (7:30am)
Conditions: Mild and humid, increasing sun throught he session
Location: Wanda Sandhills
Session: Lots of sand hill repeats. Probably just under an hour, not including warm up and cool down.
Sleep: 7.5 hours, good quality.
Feeling: Sleepy and a little impacted in the lower legs.

Basically the same deal as the last two weeks. Probably didn't have quite the same intensity as last week, although it was tough enough! Achilles and calves felt very tight in the first half. Got through the session okay, and was probably going a bit better at the end than at the start. Always good to get it done, though.

30 mins (actually 25)

Date: Fri, Oct 14 (12:10pm)
Conditions: Airconditioned, but warm
Location: St Leonards Fitness First treadmill
Session: 25 mins for 5km
Sleep: 8 hours, good quality (finally!).
Feeling: Zombie-ish until coffee at 8:45am, after that, pretty decent actually

Decided to capitalise on the good night's sleep and take the extra 40 mins when the alarm went. Shuffled through 25 mins at 5 mins per km pace on the treadmill at the gym, watching the cricket and replay of Bathurst. Felt fine, a little conscious of the hardness of the treadmill.

Still bored out of my mind, though. I don't know how people do it day in, day out.

6 x 500, 4km

Date: Thu, Oct 13 (6:30pm)
Conditions: Mild and windy
Location: Centennial Parl
Session: 6 x 500m (1:40. 1:36, 1:37, 1:37, 1:36. 1:38), 4km 15:25
Sleep: 8 hours, better than previous night but still scratchy.
Feeling: Tired and flat

Felt pretty ordinary for the session, nearly falling asleep on the drive down from St Leonards, and grabbing a quick 10 min nap beforehand.

Warm was pretty sluggish, and didn't feel great through drills. Felt better through the reps, although the final 100m into the wind was very hard through each rep. Was going okay through the first 2km of the 4k, but the two girls I was running with peeled off after 2km and I fell off pace quite markedly through the third kilometre. Picked myself up a bit for the last km to finish in 15:25 - would have preferred that under 15:20 but considering I was thinking about excuses not to attend the session, shouldn't really complain. Certainly felt better after the session.

Had a pleasant dinner with the Run Club crew afterwards, celebrating their one year anniversary. Good job, guys!

90 minutes

Date: Wed, Oct 12 (5:00pm)
Conditions: Cool and breezy
Location: St Leonards, Chatswood, East Ryde, Boronia Park, Gladesville
Session: 90 minutes, ran 81:18 for 16.17km
Sleep: 8 hours, very ordinary.
Feeling: Similar pattern to yesterday - tired in the morning, improving through the day

Couldn't get up to run in the morning, and the walk to the bus stop to go to work showed I was pretty stiff from Tuesday's session. Elected to run home from work - was okay from St Leonards to Mowbray Road, but the long downhill from the Pacific Highway to Epping Road seemed to really take it out of me, and I hooked into the Great North Walk not feeling particularly well. Struggled along from there, and elected to stop at 81 mins as we were heading out for a particularly pleasant evening, and I didn't think staying out there grinding away was doing me much benefit.

300m, 1 min recovery then 300m, 3 min - 7 repeats

Date: Tue, Oct 11 (6:30pm)
Conditions: Warm and still
Location: ES Marks
Session: 2x300m (1/3) x 7 - reps went 57s,57s,57s,56s,57s,56s,56s,57s,57s,54s,52s,53s
Sleep: 8 hours, very ordinary.
Feeling: Tired during the day but picked up a bit in the afternoon, and was reasonably bright by the time training rolled around

Pretty pleased to get through such a solid session, with a good increase in intensity in the last three reps. It was just Sam and I, but we pushed each other pretty hard in the last three reps (particularly the third last rep for the 54 - I just seemed to get a roll on from there). She goes out very hard in the first half of the rep, but I was generally able to count on her fading coming out of the final bend and run over the top of her in the last 100 metres. Good solid session, got quite a buzz out of the last couple of reps.

Also got the okay to run the SMC 5k on Sunday (although who knows how well that will go after Wanda on Saturday - but I reckon a high turnover 18 minute flogging might go alright) and to run the Striders 10k first weekend in November.

50 min easy, 10 x 100m sprints

Date: Mon, Oct 10 (5:50pm)
Conditions: Mild with gentle breeze
Location: Gladesville, Hunters Hill, Tarban Creek Reserve
Session: 50 mins for 10.46km, ave HR 129 (HRM non-responsive for 7 mins). 10 x 100m (5 x 18s, 5 x 17s) ave HR 157 inc recoveries
Sleep: 8 hours, fairly ordinary.
Feeling: Tired during the day with some residual fatigue in the legs, seemed to okay during the run.

Headed out after work for the above mentioned session. Seemed to be shuffling along but sailed through the first 1km mark about 20 seconds quicker than I expected, and sailed through the 50 minutes at a fairly effortless 4:45 per km pace. No sign of impact in the legs, just a little tiredness.

Tried a number of different techniques through the first four of the 100m repeats, and it made no difference to the time. So, I just focussed on the goal posts at the other end and said to myself "just get your arse down there as fast as you can. I don't care how". This gave me 17 seconds for the last five - which saw the heart rate peak at 179 in the last rep. Good positive end to the session.

One Year of Blogging

Missed the one year anniversary of the Vat Blog, which rolled around Wednesday last week. Where did that twelve months go?

2 hours (inc Striders Internal Half)

Date: Sun, Oct 9 (6:30am)
Conditions: Cool with fresh wind
Location: Lane Cove National Park
Session: 2 hours, including a 24 minute pre-race run and the Striders Internal Half Marathon. Ended up with 26.53km in 1:58:10, ave HR 142.
Sleep: 7 hours, good quality.
Feeling: Fairly tired, with dead legs.

SW indicated post-session yesterday that he was cool with my running the internal Half Marathon, provided I didn't race it. Johnny Dark and I got there fairly early, and I managed to get 25 minutes of running in before my 7:06am start (the internal half is a handicap event) where it was apparent I wasn't capable of racing it anyway, with yesterday's sandhill session well and truly apparent in the legs. From the start of the half I fell straight off the back of my starting group and had all of the fast guys go past me, with Darren Benson and Chris Truscott going past, with Guz on his bike, with just on 10k to go. Highlights included a toilet stop during the internal half the first time up Scribbly's, a duck taking a shot at me coming back to the turnaround, and Tiger Angel and Sfgnome's immaculate water service at the top of the climb at Lane Cove Road. Managed to ease past half a dozen runners in the last four km, so didn't finish dead last.

Made for a different long run, and quite enjoyable.

Wanda Sandhills

Date: Sat, Oct 8 (7:30am)
Conditions: Mild and windy, rising humidity post rain
Location: Wanda Sandhills
Session: Lots of sand hill repeats. 5.96km in 59:42 (distance hardly relevant!). Ave HR 151bpm, inc recoveries
Sleep: 8 hours, good quality
Feeling: Pretty good. A touch of lower leg soreness that went away in the warm-up.

Same deal as last week. Went lactic in the third rep of the second set and it was strugglesville from there on, but I was pretty happy with how I fought the session out. Heart rate was pretty regularly into the 170s with a peak of 179. I don' find the session as hard aerobically as the Tuesday night workouts, but I wouldn't say it was easy. I've included the elevant and heart rate profile.

30 min easy

Date: Fri, Oct 7 (5:50am)
Conditions: Cool, dry and still
Location: Home to Bedlam Bay Oval
Session: 30 minutes easy, 6.33km according to Garmin. Ave HR 129bpm
Sleep: 7.5 hours, good quality
Feeling: A little tired and stiff.

Out for an easy wobble around Bedlam Bay oval, and took the MP3 player to take a bit of the monotony out of it. Loosened up through the run and felt pretty decent at the end, a lot less shuffly.

6 x 1km repeats

Date: Thu, Oct 6 (6:30pm)
Conditions: Mild, dry and clear
Location: Centennial Park, off Anzac Parade
Session: 6 x 1km repeats with 2 min jogged recovery (3:36, 3:31, 3:34, 3:35, 3:34, 3:35). Ave HR 160bpm inc recovery
Sleep: 8 hours, good quality
Feeling: Okay, but a little on the tired side. Legs were okay.

A look back at the last session suggested I should be aiming at sub 3:40 for each repeat. Got through a graunchy warm up, and didn't feel great through drills. Felt okay and controlled through the first rep and was a little surprised to see 3:36, especially after Mohammed popped up halfway through. We pushed each other through to a 3:31 for the second rep which I knew was too hard, and was waiting for the crash to come later in the session. It never really did, with reps consistently around 3:34 - 3:35. Felt pretty good throughout, and worked hard to maintain pace through the last two reps. Very pleasing - I feel like I'm getting back to form.

90 mins

Date: Wed, Oct 5 (5:50am)
Conditions: Cool, dry and clear with a slight breeze. Warmer through session
Location: Lane Cove National Park
Session: 90 mins. Well, actually 91:32 for 20.27km. Ave heart rate 146bpm.
Sleep: 6.5 hours, slept well
Feeling: A little stiff and a bit jammed up in the right hip.

Had the car today and rather than drive to St Leonards and base my 90 minute run around the lower North Shore (I hate doing my mid-week long around this part of town - it's boring AND dangerous) I thought I'd get up early with EliseS and head over to Lane Cove National Park to do my 90 minutes. Did 2 laps of the Strider 10k course plus a little extra to get nearer where I'd parked. Took a while to get moving properly, eventually forcing myself closer to my target pace. Never felt particularly flash but thought I structured the run pretty well, being solid up the hills and pushing down them. Nice morning to be out there, and saw a few other CRs as well, which brightened the run up a bit.

I have access to a car through October, so will endeavour to get down to either LCNP or Centennial Park for these runs. Much more pleasant than the usual route.

5km windsprints

Date: Tue, Oct 4 (6:30pm)
Conditions: cool, dry and clear with a slight breeze
Location: ES Marks, Kensington
Session: 4.8km windsprints (float the bends, sprint the straights) in 19:12. Ave HR 170bpm
Sleep: 8 hours, not particularly high quality
Feeling: A little bit tired, with some tightness down the outside the length of both legs, although this was much improved after a warm up and some drills.

Numbers even more down this week with the soon-to-depart Martin holidaying in Cairns prior to his Melbourne Marathon assault. Looked like it might be me toiling solo under SW's supervision, but Sam turned up just before drills. She lead a few of the opening and some of the middle laps (hence the time slower than last week) before I worked on completing a hard last four laps.

Interesting session from a heart rate point of view - there is little time for recovery, so the heart rate is consistently working in a tight band from the mid to high 80%s to mid 90%s.

50 min easy, 10 x 100m sprints

Date: Mon, Oct 3 (8:56am)
Conditions: warm, dry and clear with a warm breeze
Location: Gladesville & Hunters Hill, Tarban Creek Reserve
Session: 50 mins easy, 10.19km ave136bpm, then 10 x 100m (8x18s,1x19s,1x17s) with jogged recovery ave 165bpm
Sleep: 7 hours, a little fitful
Feeling: A little scratchy after the Tigers' win last night (woo hoo!) and fairly stiff in the legs.

Fairly shuffly all the way through the run and thought the Garmin was distinctly flattering. Followed my old local 10k course with a little extension to accomodate finishing at Tarban Creek Reserve to do my 10 x 100. Felt a bit better after the 50 minutes but was never particularly enthusiastic through the repeats.

Yee hah!

2 hours - Centennial Park

Date: Sun, Oct 2
Conditions: warm, dry and clear with a fresh southerly breeze
Location: Centennial Park
Session: 2 hours, 25.75km, ave pace 4:39 per km, ave heart rate 139bpm
Sleep: 7.5 hours, slept well, although woken by alarm at 6:20
Feeling: Some stiffness from the lactic work yesterday, but reasonable. Quick check of the heartrate after getting up saw it down around 38-39.

After a fairly sluggish initial 20 minutes or so, felt pretty reasonable through until about 90 minutes, but push through with a solid last 10-15 minutes to close off a reasonable session. Lack of impact soreness from Saturday was immediately noticeable.

Wanda Sandhills

Date: Sat, Oct 1
Conditions: mild, dry and clear with a fresh southerly breeze
Location: Wanda sand hills, north of Wanda Beach
Session: Sand hills
Sleep: 7 hours, slept okay
Feeling: Okay, a little tired and could have done with a bit more sleep. Carrying a little bit of condition after going for dinner with friends the previous evening and probably had one too many glasses of red.

First of five weeks of sand hills this morning. Met the group at the reserve next to the northern most carpark of Wanda Beach. Warm up was a lap of the park, and then the gravel path up to the dunes.

The basic layout of the sand hills is that there is a lagoon at the southern end, a medium, fairly steep hill just north of the lagoon leading into a bit of a saddle, and then a second much taller and steeper north of the first dune. The saddle tends up hill heading north west up to a grassy outcrop. It's a very popular place for training - there were at least two other squads there, and apparently the rugby league teams use it for training.

The session involved 10 repeats of the northern most slope of the southern hill, then to the lagoon for four repeats of the longer, southern slope of the southern hill, three repeats of the very steep southern slope of the northern hill, and then 3 x 2 laps of a loop from the bottom of the saddle up to and around the grassy outcrop (2 laps for me was around 4:20 - 4:30). There was a 90-120 second rest between each set of repeats. Total session time was around 90 minutes. I did the whole sand session barefooted.

Very hard session, with the quads going lactic fairly early and forcing you to just cope with it. Aerobically it wasn't as intense as I thought it might have been, not that it was easy! Seemed to be more of a strength session - it was interesting to observe that I was a lot closer to the front of the group than I normally am, suggesting that it was a session that strength runners (which it would appear I am) had an advantage with.

Pleasing hit out. Much as I would have loved to do the Striders 10k at Homebush this morning, I'm glad I did this, and will ensure I get to all five of the sessions.

Jogged back to the carpark for cool down. It felt distinctly odd to be back in shoes on a firm surface.