Training in the Bank

Happy Monday folks! Another solid week for me this past week running wise. 57 miles in total for 6 days of running compared to 58 miles the previous week. I was saying to my girlfriend yesterday I’m really finding running such a tonic with all the negativity around the place at the moment. Having an hour to go into your own little world and forget about everything and daydream away to yourself is something I’m definitely grateful for currently!

Recap of Training Week Below:

Monday: Rest Day from Running!

Really needed this, body was pretty tired from the previous week and I needed the day off to absorb the previous weeks training and freshen up for the week ahead. Still got a general strength session in to work on a few weaknesses and keep on top of the Prehab work I do.

Tuesday: 8 miles easy in 58 mins.

Nice run to get the weeks training started! After taking a rest day I like to do an easy run before attempting a faster session. I always find it tough to get into the groove of a faster session after taking a rest day!

Wednesday: 2 mile Tempo 90 secs easy /5 x 2mins @ 10k pace 1 min easy 90 secs easy / 2 mile Tempo!

Looks confusing I know 😉 My brother and I are on a similar program for once at the moment and he was down for this session also and I think his response to this session when I sent it over was; are you sure? I said its grand won’t be too hard which he strongly disagreed with and he was exactly right! Actually one of the hardest sessions I’ve completed in quite a while. I wanted to get some 10k effort type work in but also some tempo work so combined both into the same session! Mentally found this one really tough as had to keep clued in for the duration covering almost 7 miles without the warm up and cool down! As with every session at the moment it was really windy! Having said all that really happy with the session.

Ø First 2 mile: 11.01

Ø 2 min efforts average 5.05 mile pace

Ø Second 2 mile effort: 10.41

Was really wiped after this one and just about managed a 2 mile shuffle for a pretty feeble cool down attempt but loved it nothing like the satisfactory feeling of knowing you’ve put in an honest hard shift 😊

Thursday: 7.7 miles recovery run in 57 mins!

Thought I’d feel worse on this but threw on the Second Captains Podcast and enjoyed a good Ken Early rant and the run was done before I knew it! Love these type of runs! I know some people out there don’t like listening to music/podcasts when they are running and actually a lot are quite strongly against it, but I say do whatever you prefer! I don’t listen to something on every run and during harder sessions I definitely won’t however for easy runs like this I tend to always listen to some sort of a podcast. I love listening to podcasts and listen to quite a lot on a weekly basis so I like using this time to listen to one of my go to podcasts!

Friday: 7 miles with 10 x 20 secs hills jog back recovery in the middle.

I’ll be honest this is the one run last week that I didn’t enjoy and just wanted to be done with, actually cut short the cool down and just hopped into my car and drove home from Phoenix Park. Don’t really know why I didn’t enjoy it, just felt like a chore from start to finish, I think we all endure runs like this every so often, but think its important to note that this can happen and that we just need to park it, consider it as training in the bank and forget and move onto to the next one! The hill efforts were actually quite good and was still a decent training effort!

Saturday: 8 miles easy 62.37.

The intention for this run was just an easy aerobic run but still didn’t expect to run over 8 minute mile pace for the first 3 miles. But look that’s what the body seemed to want to run so I obliged. As I’ve written before on this blog on easy/ recovery runs I don’t care or stress about what pace I’m running I just listen to the body and whatever pace that is it is 😊

Sunday: 15 miles in 1.42.30.

Similar to last week picked the pace up in the middle miles. In all honesty yesterday made me realise getting down to goal marathon pace wont be as easy as I’d hoped. Having completed only 3 runs over 13 miles since last August obviously I’m not going to find the longer stuff easy straight away but it made me think that I might need a few weeks/ months of 15 – 16 mile long runs each week to be ready to attempt a marathon block! Its definitely something I need to mull over during the next few weeks. That being said really really enjoyed yesterday’s run 😊

So another good week in the bank. Will aim for a similar week this week coming before I hopefully attempt a 10k Time Trial the following week!

Have a great week folks 😊

Noel