Speed work

After last week's hill reps, I'm now confident I can run (or rather walk, slowly) up Scafell. However, I'm less confident that I can keep my legs moving fast enough to descend quickly. This was highlighted in the race on Sunday when I lost ground on the flat and lost loads of ground on the descent.

So tonight, instead of hill reps, it was sprint reps. This is even more tiring. I think my flat course is about 250 metres, but it's through a sheep field, so it's not exactly perfect track training. I did 8 reps flat out before feeling completely broken. It did feel good to be running quickly again.

Whenever I do sprint sessions I am reminded how good proper runners are. I probably was close to averaging about 4:10 minute/mile pace for 250 metres. At the end of each rep, my heart rate was 165 (from 140 at the start). And yet there are guys who can run this pace for quite a few miles. Amazing.

Hill reps - not quite Scafell Pike

My local steepest hill is good and steep for about 190 feet of ascent in about 250 metres. I guess this makes it about 1 in 4. I did ten reps of it tonight. Including the hill to get to it and to get back, that's about 2500 feet of ascent in about 4 miles. My target training goal (Scafell Pike) is 300o feet in 4. 5 miles. Maybe I should do 15 reps next time.

My trace shows it was getting harder after the first four or five reps (red line = heart rate), so I hope it's good training. Although some people swear by hill reps, I think a lot of the really top runners don't use them. Also they're pretty dull. I was hoping to have the company of Max (our dog), but he's getting old enough and wise enough to wait at the mid-point.

Friday night run

It started off as a normal run that was going to be slightly longer than my normal 5-mile runs. However, within about 300 yards, I realised my legs were still "empty" after Macc Forest Five (Wednesday night). I think it's fair to say that a hard slog for 25 minutes on the bike last night wasn't the ideal recovery.

As you can see from the Garmin data, my heartbeat (red squiggle) is largely below 140 - not trying very hard.

It's funny how my sense of remoteness is directly linked to how tired I am. On today's run I felt like I was really "out there" in the wilds, even though I was only about 2 miles from the house. It's not a feeling I'm very pleased with. Ah well, it's a rest day tomorrow before a spot of cross-training on Sunday. All will be revealed...