Thursday 22 May 2014

Transition week

When making my plan for the track season the 3 races that I wanted to focus on were:
Munster Championships (5K) 15th of June
Cork County Championships (5K)  3rd of July
National Championships (10K) 19th of July
I have no goals in terms of position but I would really like to break 16minutes for the 5K and 33minutes in the 10K. Whilst my 5K PB is 16.09 my best 10K is 34.03 so it's a pretty big ask. But I'm hoping that the mileage from the marathon will stand to me.
As time is ticking I'm in the position now where I need to resume training but at the same time be aware that I'm still recovering from the marathon. There's a saying that you need a day for every mile which is a bit convenient (a Danish guy informed me that it was a day for every kilometre!) so I'm just going to go with how I feel day to day BUT no using "ah sher I'm still recovering" every time things start to get a little tough.
With this in mind I said I'd better start the week well so did an hour after work. I was happy enough with this as I was up at 3.45 to catch a flight back to Denmark.
Tuesday brought a session and it was a bit of a voyage into the unknown after Sunday's abysmal performance. When I got to the track there was a football match about to start so I had a bit of an audience. I had sub 80's in my head and said if the going got tough I'd extend my recovery from 200m to 400m. They started well, with a 76 followed by a barrage of 77's with about 66 recovery. Wasn't really looking at my watch during the session, due to having to keep my eyes peeled for bolddrengen (ball boys) but as I'm constantly finding running on feel is best and there's time enough for counting when the dealings done!
Eventually the times dropped to 78 but was still having the odd 77. The recoveries slipped out to the 70's and then 80's but never felt the need to go to 400m. Ended up doing 16 in total which was very pleasing, the last 4 or 5 were tough but I was holding back that little bit, perhaps out of fear of humiliating myself in front of the masses!
Was pretty sore on Wednesday so although I had planned a "long" but slow run, i only managed the latter part. Took it easy today and will take it very easy tomorrow. I think for now the best thing is to do the sessions and maximise recovery between them. I would think my times should improve quickly if I'm recovery but I know there has been quite a lag in the past after a marathon training cycle & seeing the benefits (and that was without actually doing the marathon!)
Monday: 8miles @7.22 HR142
Tuesday: 16x400mm in 77 with 69 recovery (10miles total)
Wednesday: 10.9miles @7.36 HR135
Thursday:7miles @7.23 HR140

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