The consequences of not sleeping

My sleeping troubles returned on Wednesday night, waking at 3am and staring at the ceiling until 5.30 when I finally decided it was an acceptable hour to hit the road. Everything was grand until after about 3 miles when my calf felt a bit of a twinge. I stopped to stretch it but it got gradually worse until I could barely run when I got home after covering 8 miles.
I went straight into icing mode and also put a compression sock on. I took Ibrufen and finished the day with a bath with Epsom salts. I had my first fast finish long run planned for Friday morning and I wanted to give myself every chance of being able to do it. Got a decent enough night's sleep and leg felt OK getting up. Agonised over whether or not to go before deciding to postpone it but in typical fashion did a Uturn when I thought about how nice refueling afterwards would be:-)

Today was also my first attempt at mid run fueling. I had bought some high 5 isogels with caffeine, the advantage of these was that you don't need water to wash them down as they were quite watery in themselves. My plan was to run my normal long run effort (HR around 140) for 10 miles and then speed up to planned marathon pace (6.15min/mile) for 6 miles. As I wouldn't know how fast I was going, due to my garmin being set to average pace it would be based on effort and HR which was probably not a bad thing. Regarding the gels I was planning on taking them at 9,12 and 15miles.

Things started well, my pace for the first 9 miles was 7min/mile with my HR well below 140 for most of it. As I would be repeating the same loop when things got faster it was a good opportunity to know what was in store. Basically the first two miles would be slightly downhill , the second two mostly up hill and the last two flat or ever so slightly downhill. My calf was OK, I was conscious of it but it wasn't sore. I decided to make the mile between 9 and 10 a transition so that the increase in pace wouldn't be too much of a shock. When this was done in 6.24 I knew I was going well! Felt a bit of a twinge when the pace hotted up but thankfully it passed. Went through the next mile in 5.44, holy shit! I thought despite it being virtually all downhill, still very fast. The next mile was a good but not quite as impressive 5.59 before moving on to the hilly section where I had 6.26 and 6.06. Was very happy with this although my effort was similar to tempo run effort. By now my HR had gone from 150's on the first 2miles to mid 160's. Perfect. It remained high when back on the flat but this was fully understandable as the next mile was 5.48. Finished off with 6 minutes on the button, shattered but very satisfied. Leg was pretty sore now and almost hobbled the two miles home.
Had an ice bath and spent the rest of the day trying to forget about it which was made easier by going to a wedding in Kilkenny. Had a few beers but was in bed by 1am. Leg still sore so taking today off,ventured in my slightly hungover state to the leisure centre in the hotel where I happily discovered a plunge pool.  Alternated between the sauna and the pool, but not sure if it made any difference. Hopefully the day off will have the desired effect.
 Thurs:8.2miles @ 7:47 HR 126
Friday: 17.8 miles, 9miles @ 7:00min/mile, 1mile @ 6:24, 6miles at 6:00, 2 miles warm down.