Running

The mesh liner has perished a bit on some of my shorts. The elasticated bits at the edge of the liner are no longer elasticated which can lead to a sudden feeling of freedom - this can be a bit disconcerting when racing.

I am starting to wear tight shorts more and more nowadays

I wish I could wear short shorts for running - as I find them a lot more comfortable in all aspects apart from the fact that my thighs chafe like fark. It's a long term goal - get skinny enough legs to be able to wear them!

Yeah, there is a limited life span of the liner elastic, as I found out when doing up my race shoes at the North Downs Run a few years ago. Oops. Got a few years out of them though!

I have to run in compression tights as shorts simply can't cage the beast.

Got my 5 mile time trial done this morning. Was hoping for sub-27 or even an unofficial pb but it was hot, and I've not even done an interval session since last year, so 27:15 not a bad effort I suppose. Results trickling in today and tomorrow... just wondering if I've done enough to top the V45 category, I can think of at least one regular rival who could scupper things if he's fit and up for it!

Favourite 10k loop today. Second time back since ankle injury. Also a 20 mile week as I've moved the 10k to Sunday. Next run Wednesday.

Still horrible but getting there.

Also think I've managed to snaffle a Garmin Forerunner 945 for relatively cheap on eBay. Will wait to see if the seller doesn't flake out for some reason. If it all works out I'll have my current 935 to be sold to cover part of the cost.

Could anyone help me worth a question about 80/20 running? I’ve read the book but am confused about this. The entirety of an interval run is classed as high effort. Is the entirety of a tempo run that has a one mile warm up/one mile warm down classed as moderate intensity or just the sections spend running at tempo pace?

I'm a details person and I read the 80:20 running book and found it light on details. It wasn't even clear whether the split was between time or distance.

The main point I took away from it was just the quote about "People do their fast runs too slow and their slow runs too fast" or whatever it was, but then I still just plod out the miles all at roughly the same pace now (especially with no parkrun).

...Winning time in the 5-mile challenge was 24:37!!

I ended up 3rd V45 and 42nd overall out of 264 - strong field. @juanito appears to have had a good run, pipping me by a second. Oof!

Re: 80:20, I'm familiar with the principle but not the actual book. My take-away would be similar to @Greenbank ; do the majority of your running at an easy pace, and you'll have some freshness for doing a relatively small volume at higher intensity. Indeed, I think it's unwise to be overly-prescriptive about the details because these will be different depending on your fitness, running experience, etc. So someone starting out from a walk/run strategy might be better off ignoring fast sessions altogether until they've got some kind of base of continuous running, whereas someone who is used to doing a couple of hard sessions a week (e.g. intervals + tempo run/parkrun, etc.) could use the principle to remind themselves not too smash it too hard on the Sunday long run.

There were some pretty impressive five mile times this weekend. My run wasn't that great - I started out waaay too hard and struggled to hold it together. It was a shame that the Met League big hitters didn't get properly involved.

I think i may have had enough of virtual racing for a while.

I've started a Ben Parkes Marathon training plan but am finding the XT days a little tough. I'm finding it tough to run after working out, possibly doing too much leg stuff. Does anyone have any good links to XT workouts that are good for runners but a little bit easier on the legs?

I've done a few runs deliberately keeping my heart rate below 135. Quite challenging!

I find it so hard balancing this stuff. Start of lockdown meant no gym or bike commute and my running went great, as soon as I've started thinking about introducing cycling again I get fuddled, and dread running with DOMs again

World Running Day!

(No, me neither, only found out when I got a digital Internet badge on Garmin Connect for going for a run earlier. Took 24s off my post-ankle 5k PB. The 10k runs are certainly starting to help.)

I've tried that before. It ended up being mostly a walk rather than a run!

Yeah it feels really strange. I’ve read that your pace increases fairly quickly after a few weeks. Quite interesting being the slowest round the park (not that I’m normally the quickest!)

An interesting fitness metric to keep tabs on is "beats per mile". I use fetcheveryone for my main training log, and if you input your time/distance/average HR it works this out for you. An advantage is that you can compare stats over different paced runs, and I found when I was doing HR training that it correlated very strongly with fitness/race performance.

I've been tracking it in my own spreadsheet for ages after someone (possibly here, pointed me to beats per mile via a Steve Way article).

Just got a new post-ankle beats per mile PB of 1479 today but:-

• I'm fat and (relatively) unfit
  
• I have a slightly smaller heart than average[1] so it can even go over 200bpm when playing 5-a-side, rarely see it over 190bpm when running though
  
• I did see 1309 beats per mile a few years ago but I was still carrying 10kg more than I wanted to
  
• Being heavy means cardiac drift due to increased body heat just makes my HR ramp up quicker than less lardy people
  
  

1. According to the person doing the ultrasound check on my valves when I had a cardiac assessment by the https://www.c-r-y.org.uk/ charity back when I was (a) young, and (b) doing lots more endurance stuff
   

I am currently following this type of training. I run at 75% of my max HR (150bpm - max@200bpm). When I started out in Nov19 I was 'running' at 7:10 mins per km (11:35ish min per mile), which was pretty much shuffling along. All my runs were at this effort. Recently got a PB in terms of pace at this effort of 5:08 mins per km (8:19ish min per mile).

In Nov19 did a 5k Parkrun (Tooting Bec) in 25:26. Last week I did a 5k Time Trial (same course as Tooting Bec ParkRun) and took 20:58.

Going at this effort has meant that I have been able to ramp up volume to where I am covering around 120ish km per week, and to generally avoid injury. Having said that, have had to take a few days off as I have a knot in my back which feels like i've been stabbed!!

Either way, lowHR training is working out well for me. Key things you need for it though are, consistency, volume, patience and trust in the method.

Nice will check it out!

This is really good to hear. I’m just a starting but reducing injury and improving my best times is exactly what I want to do.

Good work!

What cross training does he suggest and what are you currently doing? This might help give more specific advice

He actually doesnt suggest anything specific - just at XT day. I've been skipping, doing HIIT style workouts - burpess, squats, plo squats, push ups, planking etc. Sadly I dont have access to a bike currently..

I just find that my legs are a bit knackered the next day so struggling to then do the programmed runs. But perhaps this will just get easier in time.

Lovely lunchtime run today, I felt like I could just keep going and going.

Now back home though and feeling restless and a little pooped - is this normal?

Went out for a run this morning. Felt pretty good 10k in with consistent splits so kept goin’.

1 Attachment