Tom’s first Tri

As I felt pretty good during yesterday’s short hill workout I decided to throw in another run instead of resting at home and having a bad conscience because of taking it too easy. This wasn’t a brilliant idea, in fact it was a pretty dump one.
Again, ambition won over reason. In case you don’t [...]

I know that I should take a couple of days off to ensure my body’s full recovery from my half-marathon debut. But, this is easier said than done for somebody infected with the running bug
So, only two days after my sub 2hr HM finish, I went for a quick run to find out how [...]

We had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun, … 

–Seasons in the Sun by Terry Jacks
 
This was my first thought when reflecting about my half-marathon debut yesterday evening.
Yes, I enjoyed the race; I even had fun on the first half of the race, but mostly the sun worked me. Putting this altogether [...]

I officially got my runner# and the official runner’s package for this year’s Würzburg iwelt-Marathon. For the next 24 hours I’m also known as Runner #3913. The race director expects about 5000 participants tomorrow, over 3500 people have registered for the race so far.
The runner’s package included a marathon magazine, 2 energy bars (and gel [...]

Against my plan of resting for an entire week before the half-marathon I decided to check on my form on Thursday. I did so because I feared I had caught a cold on Monday and felt fatigued early in the week. So, on Thursday I went out for a run and watched my HR very [...]

I haven’t posted any updates on my training runs for a week because other tasks kept me busy. Despite having been busy I found some time to throw in workouts. This week I reduced the training volume by another (approx.) 25% but tried to maintain the intensity by doing some speed workouts. I can’t go [...]

Today at 8 AM (sharp) in the morning. The alarm goes off; time to get up, have breakfast and get ready for my last long run before my very first half-marathon road race. As told before I rescheduled my training runs in the morning to get used to running at 10 AM. Those of you [...]

I need to get used to running in the morning as road races usually take place in the early hours of the day, e.g. the Wuerzburg city marathon (in my case the half-marathon) starts at 10 o’clock.

…Not too bad for a recovery run especially when considering my lack of sleep the last night My left achilles’ heel was bugging me on the final kilometers today, probably a result of not having stretched properly after my long run. … I follow advices in literature and sports podcasts that emphasize the importance of stretching only reluctantly, but I haven’t totally lost hope in myself and hope that this negative attitude of mine is going to change real soon.

When I left home today and drove to the Wehranlagen I intended to go for an easy run and not pushing my body too hard as my legs still needed to recover from the long run on Sunday.

…What surprised me was the fact that I could maintain the faster pace throughout the second half of the run although I had granted my body a rest of only 1 (ONE) day.

…Moreover, this was the moment when I was reminded of my 25k run and that I should have allowed my body to recover instead of pushing it hard on a tempo run.

The development of my HR during the recovery period proves that my body was longing for my running at a comfortable pace which is exactly what I did in the 5 minutes following the workout.

As I haven’t done any over-distance runs (runs farther than half-marathon distance) I figured it would be a good idea to do so three weeks prior to the race.
…Of course the Nike+ system won’t be 4k wrong at a HM road race, but it’s good to know that I am capable of running a bit farther just in case the system isn’t too accurate.
…This is my farthest run yet, and yes, I slowed down during the workout, but I was trying to save some energy for the final minutes of the training session. When taking a closer look at my average HR you’ll see that I wasn’t running at full speed (remember, this was supposed to be a slow long-run!).
…Recently, I imported my entire Millencolin collection to iTunes and created a smart playlist which keeps me entertained for 2.4 hours which should cover the entire race and hopefully also the way home …