The countdown has begun....

Marathon Monday week.    What a time for ankles to start giving trouble.....  Feels a bit like plantar, its under my arches and i'm feeling a general fragileness around the ankles.    Just 2 more weeks, says he while praying to the running gods....

I went out for a very slow half marathon Monday night (almost 2.5 hours).   Feet hurting since then, but it may be also psychological as i also said it to folks in work about the run & the fact i'm doing it for diabetes research.   Nothing like a bit of fame to get the pressure on....

Anyway, i havent run since monday; I'll cycle to work tomorrow & take it from there.   I should be tapering but this might be more of a juddering stop.......

Can i say HELP......

Finally ready for the marathon?

Been a couple of weeks since i've written anything down about how training is going..... Basically life got in the way; but i've been keeping up the running and last Monday I signed up for the marathon!!!!

I hadn't done 20miles yet so handing over €93 was a bit of a leap, especially after a 23k nightmare the previous day....

Anyway a recap of the last 2 and a bit weeks;
25/9 i had a lovey 28km (c.18miles) run.   I headed out toSandymount/Booterstown direction.    The first 25k went well but the last 3km were tough enough.   I must say tho' i picked up 2 wonderful blisters, they started at 9kand kept getting worse in the wettish conditions of the day.
Due to the blisters during that week I did nothing until a 10k on friday night (24k cycling roundtrip to work thursday & friday).  I was going easier on myself because i figured the cycling counted for something, and also the thoughts of sticking a pin in the blisters didnt appeal at all, so i gave them a few days to go down.  (I do have photos of same but they are way too gross to put up, both because they're blisters, ad because they are feet).

2/10 - 23km, c.14miles.   My god what a horror.....   I didnt want to go out for a run at all, so i dilly-dallied until the afternoon, rather than going out early as i had originally planned.

I ran out to Yeat's Cottage in Howth, then back to Fairview to meet M & the kids at the gym.   Howth was looking lovely but altho i got a couple of pics i really wasnt in the mood.   It took a good 7k to warm up, i then felt comfortable for about 8-10k, then suffered for the rest of the run.   Something psychological seems to happen on these long runs, no matter what the distance its comfortable until the last few k, then the body seems to cave in.

Anyway the photos from Howth....

 Looking towards Irelands Eye from beside the King Sitric

 Same view from Yeats Cottage

And Irelands Eye from Yeats Cottage.

Signing Up for the Marathon

So I had a mare of a run, but at least i came thru it and my legs were not too bad.   The next day was the closing date for Dublin.   I had a bit of a wobble so I rang an multiple marathon and ultra-running friend Big E (who'd be running Dublin only he has had a stress factor the last few months).

He basically told me to go for it, take it slow & take the gels, that i have the distances under my belt.    Armed with this i went back to the computer and, taking the deepest of deep breaths, signed up.

So this week, with the take-it-easy approach, i did a 7k leg loosener Tuesday lunchtime (following part of the course), 10 late slow miles wednesday,  cycled to & from work thurs & Friday, and then (sadly after watching Ireland lose the RWC world cup quarter final to Wales) 6k leg loosener Saturday (I find the long runs better if i've been for a short run the day before).  

This was all building up to my 20miler this sunday.  

The Longest of Long Slow Runs

In keeping with my recent Positive Mental Attitude i was really looking forward to this run.    I planned to get the Dart/Luas into Heuston Station and join the route at the Phoenix Park.   

I ran thru a park packed with joggers and sunday morning strollers.   Its a bit far from my home but it reminded me that this is really a great park & i must bring the clann out again soon.

I could say i was comfortable for the first few k, but in reality i was comfy for the first 32k, and apart from the last couple of k (when i couldnt find a shop to replenish the water and so felt pretty de-hydrated).

I had a pretty great run, and only lost the course once.   I got to see parts of the city i'm not too familiar with and boosted the confidence that i might actually get thru this......

Anyway the route i took......

And the aftermath; I dont feel too bad as i write this, i met M & the kids at the gym and did a bit of sauna/plunge pool/swimming which seems to have loosened the legs a bit - even climbing the stairs isnt too bad (altho' i do have a bit of chaffing - more vaseline next time i think).

Oh, and finally, altho i didnt post the blisters, i will post the fact that i am now the pround owner of a black toenail - am i a distance runner yet?

An unexpected break

I haven't run since last Friday; 7 days without a run is the longest break in quite some time and certainly doesn't fit in with the plan-that-must-be-obeyed.....

The reason for this break? - a stinky head cold.    I cycled into work last Thursday & Friday (24k round trip) and Friday evening i ran 10k on a fierce-windy rain threatening evening.

I was meant to do 12k that night but  figured to cheat a little after the cycling to work.   This was to be followed by a 12 mile drop back run on Sunday (isn't it great that you get to the stage of looking forward to 'just' having to run 12 miles).

Anyway Sunday morning dawned and i just didn't feel like getting out, decided to defer to that night.   By the time evening came i was totally whacked out and decided laziness was the better part of valour and I'd be better off waiting till Monday night for my run.

Anyway Monday brought a disimprovment followed by out-of-work sick days on Tues & Wed.    I was ok to go back to work Thurs but still in no condition to go running.

And now (Friday evening)?  The current plan is to do a warm up 4 miles tomorrow and do 17 miles Sunday - bit of trepidation about this, but lets see how it goes....  Just need to get my head round to actually enjoying these runs again, and not feel like i'm on some sort of (dreadful pun warning) treadmill.

A late night 26km

Events conspired against running early yesterday (Saturday) or early today. 

Yesterday we had the normal Satuday taxi service - dropping kids here and there, and we also had a very important trip to Smyths Toy Store to get my daughter K a bike, in celebration of her being 1 year diagnosed with diabetes (might sound weird to celebrate same, but we are looking at it from the point of view of how sick she was and we didnt know why - 2 days of insulin and she was back to herself).

Anyway, this morning J decided he wanted to join the local rugby team (they dropped flyers into the school), so that cancelled running this morning (would have gone earlier but Ireland were playing USA in the World Cup, so couldnt miss that...)

Anyway short story long I got out tonight at 9:15p.m.    I needed to up the distance to 26k (16 miles).   It was a miserable wet night but enjoyable.  I did 2 loops of one of my usual routes - Raheny, down the Howth Road to Fairview, then along the Coast Road to Blackbanks and back up the Howth Road to Raheny.

The blow by blow is as follows;  first 3k were sore enough, as is becoming usual.   The ankles were twingy.   They warmed up and i felt pretty comfortable for quite a while.

During most runs i spend a lot of time negotiating with myself, tonight this took the form of telling myself not to turn for home at 10k, then at 13k, while running thru Raheny village on the first loop.  I then spent about ten minutes calculating how far i needed to run to be able to turn back & still have complete the 26k.   I find during runs that the simplest maths leaves me stumped - i figured wrong, and had i turned back in line with my calcs i'd have only done 24k.

The 2n time running the Coast Road was much windier (at least it seemed that way) but dry.  My ave time per km was moving from about 6min30sec to 7mins (it was 7mins30sec by the end of the run).   However i was still feeling okay, if tired.

My calf cramped up at about 19k and stayed cramped for a while.   I had been to a talk earlier in the week by an Irish Ultra Runner, John O'Regan, and he mentioned having a sachet of salt to take with water to fight cramp thru rebalancing your electrolytes.

I did this and it seemed to help, whether by placebo effect or not, who cares.....but as i sit here typing the calf is still pretty tender.

I reached the Bull Wall at 20.5km, which meant if i ran straight home i'd only do 24.5k, so negotiations started afresh; but there was only one real outcome likely - i didnt want to be out here running this far and this late to feel like a failure, so i passed the shortcut home and continued on the loop.

At this stage i was pretty much doing an old man shuffle but, no matter how slow, i wanted to keep as close to an impression of running as i could muster.  I did concede on one thing, i was going to stop at 26k and walk the last .3k home (i feel this helps loosen the legs a little as well as being able to finally STOP).

I did this and my time was pretty much bang on 3hours - very slow for 16 miles but i'm pretty proud of myself for getting thru it, especially late at night in such crappy weather.

The only downside is getting out of the bath at 12.45am, quite late with work in the morning.

And while am i still up blogging at 1:30am? Cause i'm on the 2am glucose check, and i know if i close my eyes now they'd need a nuclear explosion to get them open again.....

Happy running,

Waterford Half Marathon

On Saturday we drove down from Dublin to celebrate my brother in laws 40th birthday.

As we'd be down in Waterford my daughter spotted that the National Half Marathon Championships would be on the same day (good spot K).    I paid my €20 and figured i'd just use this 'Waterford Half' as a training run, adding on a bit at the end at the end to bring my long slow run for the week to 24km.

Well brain really wasnt in gear when I read the ad - did I mention the National Half Marathon Championships!!!! When I got to the car there was nary a 'fun-runner' in sight......these people literally disappeared from view in side profile.

Being one of the few possesors of extra, lets call it insulation....I knew at once i'd be watching this one from as close to the back as is possible.

We started off on the Cork Road and ran through the town to reach the Tramore Road.    The route was taking us almost to Tramore and then back to the track at the Waterforrd Regional Sports Centre.

The race started quickly and then picked up the pace....  My legs were stiff as pokers and every muscle cried out for relief.    I'm not sure what happened, was it the long drive, dehydration, lack of carbs?

Whatever it was I was stiff and sore and felt i couldn't keep going.   People were passing me with ease, and I was looking back at the end of the field wondering if I'd be finishing last.

M took the kids off to her mothers for lunch.    I thought she might watch the race from a couple of miles out the road and I was lucky she didn't - the first 3 miles were agony, and had she been there I'm pretty sure I would have just got in the car & called it a day.     As it was she needed to get K her lunch and couldnt wait, so I didnt have the chance to give up.

Just as well; after the first 3 miles the legs started warming up just as the rain began to fall.

Halfway to Tramore I could feel myself starting to enjoy the run.   I even started passing back some of the people who had passed me earlier in the race.

The rain really started to bucket (at which stage, feeling the chaffe, i vaselined up my chest, an oversight i'd pay for later...).

The rest of the run was uneventful enough, there was some great support in spite of the weather.

I was quite tired by the end, but forced myself to get through the extra runs around the track to bring the total up to 24k.    Time for the half was 2hr04m50s, with the 24 in approx 2hr27.

The legs were v. stiff the next day, but i spent an hour bodyboarding for the first time - and boy was it fun; i'm defo hooked.

Egging on Runners

(I dont mean encouraging runners, but more of that anon).

Very little blogging the last few weeks due to a) holidays and b) tiredness; but i have a couple of weeks of loving/hating my running so i thought i'd catch up with myself and my thoughts.....

Since my last post i've still been keeping to my non-plan.   However i checked my runs against the hal higdon plan i was following earlier in the year to find that as of yesterday i was only 15km short of where i should be by now.....cue surprise.


Holidays

We headed to Wexford on holidays for the 2 weeks of the 8th & 15th August.

Running was on the back foot but i got out for a few runs, but not as many as i should have done (my catholic guilt over not running was getting more exercise than my legs).

Notwithstanding this I did a good bit of sea swimming during my hols - swimming in 15C water for half an hour certainly gets the blood pumping (i must invest in a wetsuit at some stage but i dont like the feeling of them).

So a summary of my runs from Wexford...........

Week 1
Sun 7th August - 8km along beach - 48:08 mins
Tue 8th August - 12km 'out the road' towards wexford, 1hr 9 mins (running on a busy road with a 100km speed limit concentrates the mind).
Wed 10th August - 8km along beach - 54:29 mins (in my defence, very windy)

Week 2
Mon 15th 19.5km, 1hr 56 mins;  yep bit of a gap to this run, but this was one long slow run that was really enjoyable, ran out to Rosslare Port and back early in the morning, went down to Rosslare Strand before starting the run and saw a beautiful sunrise.......

When i got to the port i had to use the facilities in a local coffee shop, so i felt obliged to buy something, hence the photo of the most expensively uninspiring cookie ever....€2 for this....

And it tasted every bit as gross as the packaging suggests.

Anyway that run was wonderful, and since then
Wed 17th August - 5.3km 32 min (just wasnt in the mood and had to force myself out)
Sat 20th August - 8km 49:58 mins - back to running at 10p.m. after driving back from Wexford & helping unpack & get kids to bed, again this was a force yourself out run,


This week has been better, 32 miles in total

Mon 22/8 - 8k, 44:04mins (really tried to speed this one up, dont know where it came from, but if felt pretty good)
Thurs 25/8 - 14k, 1hr 25min - tried to stretch the distance a bit
Sat 27/8 - 8km 54:14mins - ran with a friend who is just back from injury so we took it slow (but i wasnt complaining much)
Sun 28/8 - 22km - 2hr32mins - yes i know it was slow, but i got there...

and .................. Egging on Runners......

That run last night of 22km started at 10:30pm and i got back home past 1 a.m.

The streets were wonderfully peaceful, but from a tiredness point of view i would have been happier to be in bed.   

I went out to Howth village, then back along the Coast Road to the Clontarf Bus Depot.     I had planned to do 24k, but i was seriously knackered by this stage, so knocked off the last 2 k.

And the title of this post?   As i ran along the Coast Road, a car flew past and with a guttural shout the passenger threw an egg at me.    Thankfully it missed, a little bit splashing the back of my leg.

I dont get it; what kind of a mindset would do this?   The lads werent young if they were driving a car; they also had to have the foresight to purchase the eggs.    I just cant understand how they can disrespect other people to the point of thinking this funny.   They must make their parents very proud.

Anyway they certainly didnt spoil my enjoyment of my run, or my sense of achievement in having gone out so late and still doing the long slow run, so F. them.

This week i hope to do some short runs during the week and run the Waterford Half Marathon on Saturday (altho i definitely want to do 24k so will have to keep going after the finish)....Lets see how it goes.

Stoppy Starty and Vampire Running

Both good points and bad points this week, but i'm finding it hard to motivate myself to get out, hence the stoppy starty nature of the title....

I've finally looked at my old plan for Kildare and, luckily, i seem to be following it unknowingly.   I did a 6k last Friday night, a 17.3k Bank Holiday Monday (yep should have been Sunday but the day got away from me).

I didnt get out Tues or Wednesday.   I really should have gone out last night but i was just soooo exhausted, so M and i sat on the couch and watched some tv - heaven.

Tonight i was just as tired when i got back from the ant-farm, but i got into my running gear before tea.   We all had dinner then all sat down to watch 'Sherlock' on bbc (great programme).

After kids went to bed M & myself watched more telly, by which time i felt un-tired enough to head out - hence the 2nd part of the title, most of my runs are so late i may as well be a vampire - tonight i left the house at 11p.m.

I brought the dog with me and did 6k without any music.   Sometimes its nice to tune out and self-hypnotise to the sound of foot fall and sharp breathing.   At this time of night the streets are peaceful and its quite rewarding to drag yourself out (getting into the shower at midnight is a bit of a bummer tho).

So, i need to get out for 8k at some stage tomorrow, 5k saturday and 11.2k Sunday (its a drop back week), and then see how it goes for the next few weeks.

On a slightly worrying note the left ankle was twingy most of the way and the right knee started tightening up in the last k - they're both okay now, an hour later, hopefully it'll stay that way....