Mon: 55min easy + 5 x 15 sec strides. Complete. 11.74km. Up the Dubs. https://www.strava.com/activities/9557379737
Tue: 20 min warm up, 10 x 1k (first 5 @ 3:40 & second 5 @ 3:35) (60), 20 min cooldown Complete. https://www.strava.com/activities/9563693287
Wed: 60min easy + 5 x 15 sec strides. Complete. 12.63km. https://www.strava.com/activities/9569884701
Thur: 80 min easy Complete. Pre wedding. 16.96km. https://www.strava.com/activities/9573871333
Fri: Off
Sat: 2 hours 15 min Complete. Ran Saturday and took Friday off. Session done on Sunday. 30.65km. https://www.strava.com/activities/9586359358
Sun: 20 min warm up, 30 min @ 4:00 km (2min) 20 min @ 3:55 (2min) 3 x 5min @ 3:50 km (60) , 20 min cooldown. Complete. 21.49km total (bailed a cool down). https://www.strava.com/activities/9594523732
Weekly Total: 113.5km.
The week began great before it even started. Dublin reclaiming the All Ireland Football Championship coupled with watching Brian Fay run an absolute barnstormer of a 5,000m to win the National Championships had me buoyed for a good week of training. I finished up the week before tired but with the new week brought some fresh energy. All easy runs this week where with podcasts talking about the All Ireland, specifically Second Captains, and I’ve found myself stuck bored by the debate of Footballer of the Year (of course it’s David Clifford).
This week was always going to require flexibility with Barry’s wedding on the Thursday but, up to that point, the goal was to nail the first four ays as best as possible. The 10x1km session on Tuesday evening went well, paces starting at 3:40 and working down to 3:29, which was faster than prescribed but felt largely comfortable. I did the session on the Furze Road and thankfully it wasn’t too windy at all. For the warm up and cool down, I shared some kilometres with Graham Gilshinan as he did his own session (5 x 1 mile off 90secs) and he looked to be absolutely flying. He ran 52:49 in the Kilbeggan 10 mile for 5th at the weekend.
Easy run on Wednesday out to Sandymount from town was uneventful and a nice recovery from the day before. On, Thursday, the day of the wedding, I ran 80 mins in the Phoenix Park in absolutely awful weather. Thankfully, pathetic fallacy did not rear it’s ugly, Shakespearean head and the wedding day was absolutely bliss! I didn’t have too many pints and was hoping to do my session as prescribed on Friday but the lack of sleep made that impossible. I decided to change the session to Sunday and do my long run on Saturday. This was my first 30km solo long run in quite some time but I kept it nice and easy and controlled. The pace averaged out at 4:24 per kilometre and I stayed within the boundaries of the park. The only mental battle for this run was the wind and rain. Clichéd as it is but the weather in Ireland is fairly shite. Hard to know how conducive these long runs in that weather will be for Berlin, when it is expected to be warm and sunny, but time will tell. The 12 day training block in Switzerland should help resolve any of those anxieties as the current temperature in Saint-Ursanne is 30 degrees.
Having done 30km in the park on Saturday, I took a notion that I wanted to do my session on the track and not run in the park on Sunday. Lucan track was booked up so I found myself honouring Barry and his nuptials in the only way I know how – a trip out to the track in Fernhill that he occasionally uses. On reflection, it isn’t actually a track session at all so I found it quite monotonous on the reps (30 mins, 20 mins and 3 x 5 mins) but that is ultimately good training in and of itself. The track isn’t totally flat and the first 100m’s has an incline and the final 200m’s has a decline, which for me meant I found it hard to keep a consistent pace like I normally would on a track and was surging and holding back depending on where I was on the track. Again, this is most likely good for the training so no real complaints there. The mother of all rain storms came midway through and, with it, brought a delicious and consistent gust of wind that made the second half of the session more challenging. By the time I was finished, I was fairly goosed and only did a cool down of 800m.
I feel pretty strong after this week and I’m pretty happy with how the body responded, particularly when you factor in the drinks, lack of sleep and the diet going off kilter with those few days. For the next two weeks, I will be in Switzerland training and I am super excited about this. This trip is probably 60% the right decision at the right time and 40% a gamble as I will be at altitude (not crazy high but high for me) on unfamiliar hilly routes and won’t have Barry for the long runs. Although, the second long run is short as I will be racing Clonmel Half Marathon the following week. Looking forward to reporting back from Switzerland.
Buckets of Rain 