September 2009
I know I said I’d keep this thing up to date, but it’s been really busy for the last month. So much stuff going on both with the running and with my everyday life. So I not sure where to start.....

I guess starting at the beginning would help. So far this month the training has been going well, not great but well, what do I mean by that? I think its cos I’m not sure if a)I’m pushing too hard or b) not pushing hard enough. But either way I’m feeling kind of stressed out and right now not seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. My goal for Dublin is to beat 2:43 and I think I’m on my way to do that. Although it might be a 2:42 effort.

I’ve run the first 2 of the Frank McNamara XC races and in the first I felt good even lead for a bit but ended up losing time to the first 2 guys on the way up to Keilor Road and then really just hanging on for the 3rd place. Here is why I’m a little stressed, that week I ended up running 3 tempo runs of around 40 minutes, the XC race and then a Half Marathon. All went well as I tell myself that the result don’t mean a thing as I’m building up to the Dublin Marathon on October 26th.

For the second XC race I was with the lead pack until about the halfway point and then the wheels (legs) came off, much like Mark Cavendish going up a climb in the Tour DeFrance, there was bits of calf muscle all over the trail.... and they came off in a big way, there was nothing left by the end of the race. The fact that it was about 30’C didn’t help much, nor that at lunch time I ran one of my tempo runs knowing that I was going to race that night – the weather was so good I had to make the most of it, really I have no one to blame but myself as I'm sometimes my own worst enemy. I still did my cool down run, and managed to get my 2 runs a day in for the next 2 days. On Saturday thinking I was recovered I attempted to run 10x3 minutes with 2 min Active Recovery (trying to run at my 3K -5K pace for each of these) I got as far as 6 before I had to call it a day, so I finished up with about 45 minutes of easy running. Sunday I decided to run long thinking it would be easy, I ran about 37K on the trails and then came home in a heap. Its training like this that gets you stressed, mainly due to how it makes you feel insecure about how well you’ve run so far this year.

I missed the third XC race due to the fact that we moved houses. Moving house in the middle of a project at work and in the build up to a marathon is not the greatest idea. But there you go; life sometimes gets in the way of running. We moved houses and my training suffered that week so I’m going to call that a rest week. One of the bad things about this time of year is its now dark in the mornings and since moving I haven’t felt like getting up at 6:00am to run. I think this is due to the curtains we have now, they completely block out the sun light whilst before we had a rounded window that was not covered and any light got in. It’s like I’m catching up on all of the sleep I’ve missed for three years.

I have 18 days before I fly to Dublin and then a week to ten days for a taper before the race. I’m confident that I can run at my goal pace (of 3:40 – 3:45 Per K) I will be running 2 more 37K runs with Marathon paced segments (as that will make it 5 2:30 – 2:50 runs) as well as the next 3 XC races. I’ll also keep my tempo runs going at Lunch time.

One of my concerns outside of running, but which indirectly has a knock on effect is the closing of the parking lot that I’m using. This means I have to think about getting to and from work either by public transport or on shanks mare or pay twice what I was paying to park my car per day. If I use Shanks mare (or my own 2 legs) then it’s either running home or cycling to work and back. Which works out to be either a 90 minute run one direction per day meaning I get home approx 7:00pm or it’s a 90 minute ride (round trip) on my bike. Taking the Public Transport in Edmonton can drain the life out of you if you leave out on the edge of town.

I’m thinking I’ll take my bike...will keep you posted. Well that’s my rant for this week over.

Winnipeg and back

Second Half of August 2009

After the ½ Marathon I felt really good, I think I came out of it under the impression that if it had been a flatter course I could run faster!!! So I decided to up the mileage little as I’ve been finding it difficult to get in those big weeks of training that is needed for a good Marathon, rather at staying at my consistent weekly mileage of between 60 and 70 miles a week. My wife and son went to Winnipeg for a week which meant that I could now stay in bed longer in the mornings and still get my 2 runs in a day. I was to follow them out to Winnipeg later in the week. I got in some good runs, however I may have over extended myself as the recovery has been a little slower this week, and I haven’t been as enthusiastic about training as I normally am. So I decided to take this week as a recovery week, so very little and light training only until Sunday when I’ll do my long run.

While in Winnipeg I was noticing that my I was running much faster than my usual pace and it all felt easy, trying to slow down felt hard though and going from 3 minute per K speed to 3:30 minute per K speed kind of felt like going from easy jogging to walking.

On the Friday I ran a loop that I’ve been using for almost all of my training while in town, in and around St. Vital Park, but this time I included a stretch of the Bishop Grandin Greenway(?) this a new stretch of path that runs alongside the highway. It’s here that I found that I was motoring along faster than my normal training pace, which was a good thing as the next day I wasn’t able to run due to our son deciding that he didn’t want to nap during the day and family gatherings, until I put him in a carrier called an Infantino(sp) then he slept for about 2 hours by which time I could’ve gone running but then the guests had arrived so it was too late.

The next day I ran my long run also on a normal training route that I’ve been using. Going from my Father in-law’s place over to the University and out to St. Norbert and back, except that this time I kept going past the floodgates through Turnbull and on towards Ritchot. Going out was easy enough so I turned around at just over 17K. But coming back was hard, nothing to do with the course as it was pretty flat, mainly to do with the heat and me having only one bottle of Gatorade with me. By the time I got back to St. Vital Park I was done, there was nothing left; I just wilted in the heat. I think there was about a 15 – 30 second difference per kilometre in the two halves. The temperature was about 26’C.

This week as I say has been a very slow week due to a couple of things that I have no control over. On Monday I was up at 5:00am (Winnipeg time) to catch a flight back to Edmonton and then on Tuesday morning I got a call from work just before 6:00am as there was a problem with one of the branches on Wednesday I had an early appointment at Canada place and then had to pick up the family at the airport after work in the evening, so I’ve been short sleep for a couple of days and this just added to the tiredness that I was feeling overall. I did manage to run Tuesday night, but felt like crap. I got two runs in on Thursday and Friday 2 X 40 minute runs.

Although on Saturday I was thinking of riding My Mountain bike for a bit – although not sure yet as the Temperatures are supposed to be up around 29’C for the next couple of days.

Anyways Happy running

August 17th 2009
This post has been a long time coming as things have been getting a little crazy the last couple of weeks. We decided to sell our house, which can be pretty stressful and when we sold it we didn't have a place to move into plus the fact that through all of this I'm trying to train for a Marathon.....its no wonder I have Grey hair :)

The last couple of weeks of training have been going pretty smoothly with the mileage starting to creep up to appropriate levels. I decided that rather than have a set amount of mileage to do every day I would go by time.

So far this month it has worked out well - next month may be a little different though as there is a lot of Cross Country running in town with both the Saucony/Athletics Alberta Race Series and the Frank McNamara Wednesday Fall Race Series. I'm hoping to use both of the leagues as part of my build up to Dublin in October.

Here is an example of My training plans for August / September / October

Monday = 30 minutes + Yoga am
Tuesday = 60 minutes am (inc 6x3mins building to a max of 10x3mins with 2mins AR*) + 40 minutes pm easy
Wednesday = Yoga am + 90 - 100 minute run home (with some Tempo paced running)
Thursday = 60 minutes am + 40 minutes pm easy
Friday = 60 minutes am + 40 minutes pm easy
Saturday = 90 minutes (inc 6x6minutes building to a max of 10x6minutes with 4mins AR*)am + Yoga pm
Sunday = 120 minutes building to 160 minutes am + Yoga pm

In September /Early October - I'll be running the XC races rather doing two days of intervals and will be doing my mid week long run on a Thursday instead (at an easy pace). Since I'm also doing a Half Marathon in Mid September I'll be doing that instead of a long run.

*AR = Active Recovery

Notes - There is a lot of Yoga on the schedule, as this is a good way to stretch and you need to balance the running with a lot of recovery. Most of the time this will be me and a video tape or DVD, but I will try to get in at least one class a week depending on how things are going.

Races in August - Intact Edmonton 1/2 Marathon

Yesterday I ran the Half Marathon and set a new PB for that distance. I finished in a time of 1:17:48 (gun time) I felt pretty good throughout the race, the Newtons performed as I've come to expect them to which is amazingly. I wish I could tell you about the Kenyan guys that won, but the closest I got to them was standing behind them at the start line. I think I might have seen them once on the course over near 149th street, but those guys run so fast I might have been imagining it.

I saw Jonathon at the start also and then maybe one more time in the race, but hes a couple of minutes faster than me. What I as happy aobut more than anything was the fact that I ran three minutes faster than I did at the Red Deer 1/2 Marathon. A second thing that made me feel good about the race was the fact that I didn't cut back on any mileage ,so there was no tapering for yesterdays effort, it was a replacement to a long run.

Whats next?
I'm entered into the Rotary Half out in Stoney Plain on September 13th, I think I'll be running most of the Wednesday night XC races, plus at least one of the Saucony/AA series. depending on how all of this goes I'll also try and do the Devon Turkey Trot 10K before heading to Ireland.

Happy running
Niall