Tom Roper's Running Training

Seven miles steady

I ran to Bo Peep and back. I think I'm getting into the swing of training.

Time: 1:13:30
Distance: 6.99
Pace: 10.31

Creed

As it's not really about running, if you want to read my reactions to Martin Creed's work 850, which I mentioned a few posts ago, and see some not very good iPhone pictures, go to the main blog:

http://tomroper.typepad.com/tr/2008/07/running-in-the.html

First interval run: 6 X 800m

On Tuesday night, resolved not to let the commuting get in the way of training, I did my first interval run in the preparation for Beachy Head. Domestic need, that us to say the voice of the Burra Mem, made me curtail warm-up and cool-down to a half-mile.

Time: 41:48
Distance:4.43
Average pace: 9.27

1st 800m: 4:09:27
2nd 800m: 4:19:54
3rd 800m: 4:26:26
4th 800m: 4:29:91
5th 800m: 4:50:67
6th 800m: 4:45:11

To Firle Beacon

Hard work again, and the knee gave me trouble after the fifth mile, but that serves me right for not stretching.

Time: 1:29:16
Distance: 8.31
Pace: 10.44

Total mileage this week: 15.45
Fourteen weeks till the Beachy Head marathon

First run for thirteen days

This is not the way to train for a marathon. I ran today for the first time since Sunday 6 July. It was hard on the legs, and on my breathing; my asthma seems to get worse. Down to the front, and along in a strong wind. About half way through I started to feel as if I was doing something familiar.
Time: 50:10
Distance: 5.01
Pace: 10.00

Work no 850

http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/exhibitions/duveenscommission/default.shtm
'For reasons of safety, we ask the public not to run or obstruct the runners'. A pity, I was going to take my shoes on my next visit to Tate Britain. From the website:
'Work No. 850 centres on a simple idea: that a person will run as fast as they can every thirty seconds through the gallery. Each run is followed by an equivalent pause, like a musical rest, during which the grand Neoclassical gallery is empty.

For the last runs before training starts, I chose to go to Frog Firle on Friday, but missed High and Over out of the route to make a slightly shorter run. On Sunday I ran out to Bo Peep; at first it rained but stopped after the first mile. It was hard work and I felt tired. I hope that my new anti-hypertensive and asthma medication sorts me out soon.

Data: (Garmin figures given first, then SportBand ones)

Saturday:Time: 43:53/43.15
Distance: 4.91/4.18
Pace: 10.11 (best 7.57)/10.20
Sunday
Time: 1:15:44/1:22:45
Distance: 6.90/6.75
Pace: 10.59 (best 5.34)/12.14

Alea iacta est

It dawned on me that, if I were to enter the Beachy Head Marathon, I needed to do so now, and start training next week, a sixteen-week programme of three runs a week, interspersed with other activity, such as swimming.

So I have done so and my entry has been accepted. I shall not enter the Hastings Centenary Marathon.

Running on Sundays

Oh dear. I only managed to run on Sunday, with a gap of a week since my last run. I have done no swimming either, which might have redeemed me. However, a consultation about my asthma with a doctor who once treated Steve Ovett make me hope that I shall become faster. This run was down to Splash Point, where the RSPB's kittiwake observation point is now open, though kittiwake numbers are down. Data is from the Garmin only; I wore the SportBand, but fumbled with the start/stop button.

Time: 50:40
Distance: 4.91
Pace: 10.19 (best 6.24)

Sunday run to the sea

I have now calibrated the SportBand, so the distance readings are much more reliable; so would the time and pace readings if I learnt how to stop it properly at the end of a run.

Time: 50:53(Garmin)/57.44(SportBand)
Distance: 5.01/4.99
Pace: 10.10 (best 7.4)/11.32

Open air swimming

I think I have overcome the trouble with running I've had ever since the London Marathon. I've lacked speed, but more than that, I've felt sluggish and unmotivated. Eleven lengths (506m) of the Pells Pool at lunchtime on Tuesday cured it all, so much so that I also ran in the evening. When I was a child in Cambridge, exercise invaiably meant swimming, in the Cam or at Jesus Green. My father, a doctor, lived to swim and used to arrange his rounds so as to fit in a swim on his way home. My brother and I would be taken, not always willingly. Indeed, the wet wood and urine smell of the changing rooms at Jesus Green, and the curious carvings in the wood walls, graffiti and artists' impressions of the female nude, were unpleasant, and I well remember a Sunday swim in the rain aged twelve, after which I felt very ill and was found to have viral pneumonia. I was reminded of all this by reading Kate Rew's book, Wild Swim. I shall do more of this.

For the run:
Time: 49:29(Garmin)/49.32 (SportBand)
Distance: 5(G)/5.51(SB)
Pace: 9.54 (best 8.05)G /8.58 (SB)