Gosh it has been a big week. Both for training and life in general. This week I completed my second biggest mileage week ever edging over the 70km mark.
Nanna
I wasn’t sure if I would write about this but I feel like it would be dishonest and perhaps disrespectful to leave out and only write about the good things.
On the weekend my Nanna passed away peacefully. I am happy I had the chance to say goodbye and we have plenty of great (and hilarious) memories. She was definitely a character and lived an incredible and tough life.
Birthday celebrations
Having my birthday this weekend was honestly a good thing on what was otherwise a sad weekend. And what better way to celebrate a birthday than to run an 18 min threshold followed by 4 x 3 min hill reps.. right? Haha well I enjoyed it and the post run birthday cupcakes 🙂
I hadn’t actually planned anything for birthday evening – Saturday nights are generally a quiet night for me with Sunday morning long runs. But I never say no to an offer of dinner, thanks Brigitte. Followed by Caitlin’s creative tim tam engraving for birthday cake number 2.
On Sunday we had the family get together for lunch. Lasagna, garlic bread and birthday cake number 3 a home made strawberry cheese cake!
This week
This week officially marked the switch to half marathon and marathon specific phase training, and gee it was a pretty big training week.
Tuesday introduced long reps with a 4 x 2km track session with 400 jog recoveries. I was slightly off the 8:40 target pace but think I’ll get there after doing this session a few more times.
Wednesday I was cursing Chelsea a little. Usually a 10km run at a pretty easy pace which was nice recovery between harder sessions. It’s now a marathon/sub marathon pace kinda run. Overall it was 3km longer and around 20 secs per km faster than usual.. and day after just getting back into longer reps!
Thursday I was worried I might be tired, but to Chelsea’s credit I was fine and knocked out my half marathon pace session no problem. It was a really nice evening run along the Altona beach path.
Saturday we had the Western Athletics pack run at Brimbank Park. First off an 18 min threshold, started out a little fast (I blame dodgy GPS) and then eased towards target pace. The threshold alone was pretty tough and still had hill reps to do up the Brimbank Park road.
The hill starts off reasonably ok, and then gets very steep halfway through but flattens out at the end as you reach the top. These were tough.. 3 minutes feels like a long time when you’re running up hill. At least I had Stephanie and Steven join in and feel my pain!!
Finally on Sunday the 2 hour long run. I was supposed to do the last 10 minutes at 4:38 pace but it was not happening today. My legs were so tired from the hill reps I was finding it a struggle to run at all. So just a slow jog and happy to just get the 2 hours done.
Finished up this week at 71.4km total which is the second biggest week I’ve done, and also only the second time I’ve gone over 70km.
Also thanks Strava.. I guess it’s time to replace my Air Zoom Odysseys.
Running
| Day | Details |
|---|---|
| Mon | Rest |
| Tue | 2km warm up Drills and strides 4x2km at 8.40 with 400jog recovery (8:42, 8:47, 8:42, 8:42) 2km cool down |
| Wed | 4km at 5.00, 2-4 min jog recovery, 4km at 4.55 ,2-4min jog recovery, 4km at 4.50 pace (Session 4:57 avg pace / 159bpm) |
| Thu | 5km @ 4.50 (4:48 avg pace/ 155bpm), 7km @ 4.38 (4:36 avg pace/166bpm) |
| Fri | Rest |
| Sat | 2km warm up 18 min threshold @ 4.30 (4:25 avg pace/173bpm) 4 x 3:00 hill reps (4:57 avg pace/163bpm, 5:08/168bpm, 5:14/166bpm, 5:03/165bpm) 2km cool down |
| Sun | Long run 2 hours (You Yangs 5:47 avg pace/ 146bpm) |
1%-ers
| Day | Details |
|---|---|
| Mon | Light strength/activation work (20 mins) |
| Tue | Foam rolling (30 mins) |
| Wed | Stretching (30 mins) |
| Thu | Foot/calf stuff and foam roll (45 mins) |
| Fri | Hip routine for runners (25 mins) |
| Sat | |
| Sun | Cold bath (15 mins) Stretching (30 mins) |
Coming up
A new special event coming up.. Ben and Sharon’s Fun Run! We want to do a 15km race as a test for Gold Coast half marathon. However we couldn’t find any ideal fun runs so instead we have created our own.
The event will take place 8am on the 10th of June. Starting off with the park runners at Princes Park for a fun run feel but we will keep running laps around the park until we hit 15km!
- 27 May – Cruden Farm Cross Country (16km)
- 10 June – Ben and Sharon’s Fun Run (15km time trial)
- 17 June – Bundoora Cross Country (10km)
- 2 July – Gold Coast Half Marathon
- 8 July – Sandown Road Relays (6.2km)
- 16 July – Albert Park Road Race (10km)
Summary
| Week | Phase | Runs | Km | Hrs | TSS | Fitness | Fatigue | Form |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 36 | MARATHON | 4 | 59.2 | 5:17 | 426 | 61 | 73 ↑ | 23 ↑ |
| 35 | Taper | 4 | 41 | 3:32 | 314 | 61 ↓ | 55 ↓ | -1 ↓ |
| 34 | Marathon | 4 | 62.1 | 5:26 | 450 | 64 | 76 ↓ | 6 ↑ |
| 33 | Marathon | 4 | 63.4 | 5:34 | 467 | 64 ↑ | 82 | 2 ↓ |
| 32 | Marathon | 5 | 70.7 | 6:23 | 502 | 63 ↑ | 82 ↑ | 7 ↓ |
| 31 | Marathon | 4 | 48.4 | 4:13 | 367 | 61 ↑ | 68 ↓ | 8 ↑ |
| 30 | Marathon | 4 | 63.9 | 5:43 | 462.1 | 62.7 ↑ | 78.3 ↑ | 4.0 ↑ |
| 29 | Marathon / recovery | 4 | 58.4 | 5:06 | 426.2 | 61.8 ↑ | 77.3 ↓ | -0.6 ↓ |
| 28 | Marathon | 4 | 66.5 | 6:06 | 486.1 | 61.6 ↑ | 82.5 ↑ | 3.6 ↑ |
| 27 | Marathon | 4 | 66.5 | 5:50 | 482.1 | 60.1 ↑ | 79 ↑ | 0.5 ↓ |
| 26 | Recovery | 4 | 54.3 | 4:54 | 386.3 | 58.1 ↓ | 69.5 ↓ | 3.5 ↑ |
| 25 | Build | 5 | 64.9 | 5:51 | 454.6 | 58.3 ↑ | 72.0 ↑ | -2.3 ↓ |
| 24 | Build | 5 | 64.5 | 5:41 | 482.6 | 56.8 ↑ | 64.6 ↑ | 3.1 ↓ |
| 23 | Build | 4 | 46.9 | 4:07 | 340.5 | 54.9 ↓ | 51.8 ↓ | 7.3 ↓ |
| 22 | Build | 4 | 43.6 | 3:55 | 307.3 | 55.9 ↓ | 52.1 ↓ | 11.1 ↓ |
| 21 | Half Marathon | 4 | 41.8 | 3:31 | 311.1 | 58.0 ↓ | 55.0 ↑ | 20.5 ↑ |
| 20 | Taper for HM | 4 | 37.5 | 3:10 | 304.9 | 60.1 ↓ | 52.4 ↓ | 14.6 ↑ |
| 19 | Recovery | 3 | 41.6 | 3:39 | 302.6 | 63.0 ↓ | 59.8 ↓ | 10.5 ↑ |
| 18 | Half / Marathon | 5 | 71.8 | 6:03 | 541.4 | 66.6 ↑ | 86.0 ↑ | -7.4 ↓ |
| 17 | Half / Marathon | 4 | 66.5 | 5:47 | 490.2 | 64.3 ↑ | 79.7 ↑ | -3.2 ↑ |
| 16 | Half / Marathon | 5 | 64.4 | 5:32 | 479.2 | 62.9 ↑ | 76.0 ↓ | -7.7 ↑ |
| 15 | Half / Marathon | 5 | 71.4 | 6:09 | 527.1 | 61.7 ↑ | 77.8 ↑ | -7.8 ↓ |
| 14 | Speed / Half | 5 | 63.8 | 5:38 | 460.2 | 59.0 ↑ | 70.3 ↑ | -1.0 ↓ |
| 13 | Speed / Half | 5 | 59.1 | 5:20 | 419.4 | 57.5 ↑ | 60.9 ↑ | -3.7 ↓ |
| 12 | Recovery | 4 | 39.1 | 3:21 | 288.2 | 56.9 ↓ | 54.8 ↓ | 6.5 ↑ |
| 11 | Speed | 5 | 59.1 | 5:14 | 421.8 | 59.6 ↑ | 70.4 ↓ | 1.7 ↑ |
| 10 | Speed | 5 | 61.6 | 5:23 | 460.3 | 59.3 ↑ | 71.8 ↑ | -1.9 ↓ |
| 9 | Speed | 5 | 58.0 | 5:06 | 436.1 | 57.9 ↑ | 67.8 ↑ | 3.4 ↑ |
| 8 | Recovery | 5 | 49.7 | 4:18 | 395.8 | 56.8 | 61.5 ↓ | -1.3 ↓ |
| 7 | Base | 5 | 54.2 | 4:44 | 417.0 | 56.8 ↑ | 64.4 ↑ | 2.3 ↑ |
| 6 | Base | 5 | 51.3 | 4:33 | 392.3 | 56.1 ↑ | 61.0 ↓ | 1.5 ↓ |
| 5 | Base | 5 | 52.5 | 4:32 | 421.5 | 55.9 ↑ | 61.7 ↑ | 2.2 ↓ |
| 4 | Recovery | 5 | 46.5 | 4:03 | 353.7 | 55.0 ↓ | 54.5 ↓ | 4.4 ↑ |
| 3 | Base | 5 | 50.4 | 4:22 | 381.7 | 55.7 ↓ | 57.1 ↓ | 1.2 ↓ |
| 2 | Base | 5 | 50.2 | 4:23 | 381.2 | 55.9 ↓ | 57.4 ↑ | 5.9 ↓ |
| 1 | Base | 5 | 43.9 | 3:52 | 334.3 | 56.0 | 53.4 | 8.3 |
Birthday Hills were a gift from me….esp after a tough week for you and your family…big week tick tick….