I'm Back

These photos are courtesy of Racepix365.com

Just got back into town from my running vacation to Dublin. Things went pretty well, I brought my training down quite a bit. The jet lag and the lack of sleep due to looking after the young fella was started to take its toll. I did manage to get some training done in the week leading up to the race, as well as do quite a bit if eating to make sure I had enough carbs in.

The Race itself went well, although initially I was disappointed in not breaking 2:40 I did manage to take almost 3 minutes off my previous best marathon time, so any disappointment was quickly over taken by that. Looking through the results/splits I can see that I had one of the slowest 10K time splits in the race followed by a fastish (for me) Half way split and then it was only at around the 1 mile point that we started to make inroads on the guys that started out fast. I went through the 30K split in just under 1:53 and then I started to slow down at around the 23 mile mark. I think though I had started to fall of the pace closer to the 32K point as the 5K splits took a little longer each time (last 2 5K splits), I did end up finishing in 2:40:22. Everybody slows down, its just a question of how much, so I didn't really slow down that much.

I felt great right after the race, as both myself and my family ended up doing a lot of walking, but even the next day I did a fair bit of walking and the legs didn't really complain that much. I did have one problem, but that seems to have sorted itself out, my big toe on my right foot wasn't bending as much as it had the day before the race. This is the same problem I had just before leaving for Dublin. I'm not sure what is causing it, it may be the shoes but then it may not be.

The Dublin marathon also doubled as the Irish marathon championships, so this year I joined a club in Dublin called Dundrum South Dublin to be eligible for it. Two of the club runners finished ahead of me, the first guy finished with a 2:30 something and the second guy finished in 2:37. Both of the guys finished in the top 50 overall, with me finishing in 52nd place. The three of us managed to win the gold for the team competition, which was a real surprise both to myself and to the club as I kind've ran under the radar as I wasn't wearing a team singlet I also managed to take a bronze in the M35 age group. I had decided that I would wear my FastTrax vest as its what I'm used too.

So what do I take from this race? - I believe that I can and will go sub 2:40, how far below I'm not sure. I think that my training wasn't the greatest in the lead up to the race, but instead of adding more and more mileage I have to start thinking that I need to do more quality workouts rather than the quantity of workouts.

Where to next? Its a little early to be thinking of another marathon. Plus the next one I run will have to be closer to home, so I have some time yet before I run that distance again. In May there is a choice of 3 marathons in Western Canada (that I know of) Vancouver, Red Deer and Calgary. I ran Vancouver in 2007, that is the place I first went sub 3hrs. Red Deer..... I'm not that sure about as I ran the half there in May and I didn't really like the course. Calgary was the provincal championships last May so if its that again in 2010 then I'm kind've leaning on Calgary.

Arrrgh last minute hiccups

Well its almost time to think about going to Dublin for the race. But I've had a couple of other things to worry about this week or so. My training up to now has not been the best, not bad but not the best that it could be. Last weekend I ran for 80 minutes on Saturday and then 1:50 on Sunday morning with about an hour at race pace and then on Monday I ran for 2:30 which included a good number of hills. Tuesday I then ran easy (very easy for me) for 45 minutes, but missed yesterday due to workload, I also missed the last XC race (for me anyways) as I was still working late.

So up until Tuesday I was pretty happy with how things are going, but on Tuesday I noticed that there is a problem with my left foot that only appears when running, I can't seem to toe off as I normally would. I can't seem to bend my big toe on that foot as much as I can on the other. On Friday I'll get an adjustment and bring that up with the Chiro. Not sure what brought this on, I think it could be a combination of new Hardwood floors and not getting enough stretching in, it may in fact be the shoes that I wore on Sunday.

Once I get to Dublin, I was going to begin my taper but I don't think I'm going to cut back as much as I normally would now...(no long runs however) I'll get a few short paced runs in and a bunch of easy runs.

This last month or so has seen a number of solid results from Edmonton based runners. A couple of the guys I run with had some very good performances at the Chicago Marathon, both Kevin Masters and Marc Meunier both came home with great new PB's. A.J Rankel ran a solid race in the Berlin Marathon, made even more amazing that he ran with a cast on one of his arms, then at the Victoria Marathon Jonathon (AKA Basil) Withey from the FastTrax team ran a PB to finish in the top ten, while Stephen Toal ran under 3 hours in Victoria (not sure if that's a PB for Stephen. Also I can't forget Jason Kincaid's performance at the Hawaiian Ironman.

Great job everyone!!

I try and take these performances and use them as a positive for my own race yet to come. I would like to get on the plane with a new PB, even if its only a second faster than my previous PB, as then I would have something to shoot for in the spring.

Thanks for reading - Will update while in Dublin.

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.