I’m slow updating the blog this week, busy times… So going back to last Friday…

Back playing squash with my Dad again following the Christmas shutdown. First game I nearly won but after that I was soundly beaten. Two weeks off and the muscles were not expecting 40 minutes of dashing around and I was quite achy on Saturday morning.

Saturday I decided to shake out the squash aches with a run. This was the worst run I have ever had. I was out for a little over an hour and covered seven and a half miles but I didn’t enjoy it. My legs fatigued so it was laborious to move them, just underneath my toes started to ache, my shins were sore, and I found myself having to walk for stretches of the distance. Not happy about that really, I have less than seven weeks to go before the killerthon and I’m running like I did 12 months ago. To compound matters all of the above aches are with me five days later which has meant that I haven’t really been out there rebuilding my stamina.

Yesterday I played squash, this time with a mate from work. This is secret extra court time so that I get good enough to give my dad a run for his money, and certainly playing someone of my own ability I was able to win a couple of games, but it is a good all round work out too. Nearly a thousand calories are burned during a game of squash which seems to be more than pretty much any other activity.

I’ll have a rest day today and then another game of squash on Friday with a run on the weekend… I do get the feeling that I don’t know how to train for an race though. When I was training for the DW kayak race (which is still on my mind btw. I just need a plan of action) I was running and swimming. When I was training for a swimming event I was out on my bike and now that I am training for a distance run I am playing squash.

I do need to research into my sore feet problem though as it is quite a painful issue at the moment and quite demoralising knowing that after a run I am going to be hobbling around for a few days. The internet will find a solution for me.

Probably the last post of '09

Due to Christmas my 14 week training program has gone a bit awry with things getting cancelled so I can go out and be merry. Last week was all to cock with just a big run on Saturday to add to the road miles.

Problems are occurring though. Firstly I am getting hideous horrendous blisters in the arch of my foot. Really gory messy things which made running difficult and putting shoes on afterwards agony. One blister was just shredded skin by the time I had completed the 7.4 mile run and although sore, wasn’t as bad as the blister on my left foot which was still intact, it was about the size of my thumb and for some reason I couldn’t lance it, it resisted the needle as though made of rubber, so every time I put pressure on my foot, the fluid felt like it was about to explode out through the skin. Not nice. To make matters worse I had tried to protect the area with strips of tape, which were supposed to take away any friction that was causing the damage. The blisters formed anyway.

Then the other thing which is a new pain is my toes. My three middle toes hurt like hell, still do actually. The internet tells me that it is because I am landing too hard on my feet. I’m intrigued how I can land less hard on my feet, unless I learn rudimentary flight I can’t think how to go about it.

So here I am at Tuesday in Christmas week and I have zero plans now to add any more miles onto my tally, I also have quite extensive plans to eat and drink to excess. I think week 4 of the 14 week plan will see me having taken a back step from where I was two weeks ago. I might blog again before Christmas but don’t count on it, as there is slim chance I will have done anything meaningful to blog about.

Will continue in the new year.

I went running properly last night for the first time since the Great North Run all the way back in September. I have kept myself pretty active in the intervening eight weeks with swimming and squash while I waited for the doctor to give me the nod, but I can’t believe how much my running fitness has fallen off. The blisters I accept were likely as my feet have got soft but the deep muscle ache that I have this morning was a bit of a surprise.

This run was a bit of a get back into the swing of it run so I ran an easy pace, 4 miles in about 40 minutes about 6 miles an hour, I wasn’t really watching the clock this time so no exact mph’s today.

I have got to be more structured and set myself less damaging targets if I am going to avoid a recurrence of the shin pain, so I am going to put together a more strict plan with a less rapid increase in distance. My target is to be race fit for the killerthon in March, and my cunning plan is to work out a training schedule working back from 14th March to now, building in mileage increments and some tapering at the end. My goal to complete the 16.3 mile event in about 2 hours 30 minutes, that’s averaging over 6 miles an hour for the distance which is something I am confident I can achieve after doing the half mary at that sort of pace, and with some structured training this time I think I will manage the extra distance.

I am now trying to instigate the Sunday Big Run. I plan on running the big distances every Sunday, being driven to locations at increasingly longer distances from home, and then I run back. (I say plan but I already have other plans for this coming Sunday.)

This weekend saw me start the Sunday Big Run ball rolling with a 10 miler. I got there at about 8:30 in the morning, partly because the F1 was on early and partly because a large bulk of the route was along a pathless B road, so I didn’t what to have to dodge a lot of traffic.

All told I got home in 1 hour and 38 minutes which was about what I expected to complete based on the half marathon time. I have a couple of massive blisters in the arch of my foot have appeared again. I wonder why that part of my foot has suddenly started rubbing? And my shins are a bit achy again.

One concern on the shin front is the bone in my left shin. My left leg is the more troublesome, with more sever shin splint pain and more sever muscle aches. I have noticed over the last couple of weeks that the middle of the shin bone is getting denser than its opposite number on the right. I’m contemplating going off to see the doc but I fear he will 1/ call me a big girls blouse and 2/ will tell me to stop running on it.

when running goes bad

I have been reading on peoples twitters and blogs about having a “bad” run. I’ve not had a bad run yet, I’ve had hard runs, and painful runs, and enjoyable runs. Last night I think I had a bad run.

I chose to do my preferred 4.2mile route around the back lanes I also decided to run with wrist weights on to work my upper body a little bit harder. It took me 45 minutes and was gruelling.

The wrist weights were a surprise load on my CV system and I found it a bit tougher, especially up hill but that wasn’t what made it a bad run. My legs felt like lead, muscle cramps and general all over pain made running a bit grim.

Getting back I found it difficult to warm down, and sleeping was made uncomfortable as I had terrible aches in the back of my legs and today I have very tight leg muscles.

I don’t know why the run went bad. Maybe it’s the weather as it has gone cooler over the last few days. Or maybe it is this trace of a cold that I have, or maybe it was the wrist weights adding to the load on my pegs, or maybe it is just one of those things that runners have to put up with from time to time.

Went for a quarter marathon run last night. 7.1 miles in 1 hour and 2 minutes. Pleased with that sort of pace which is about the 7mph mark. If I could have kept that pace up for another hour (and there was plenty of running left in me by the time I had finished) I would have got my half marathon time under the two hour mark. I did slow towards the end though as several very unpleasant blisters had formed in the arch of my foot. These blisters are a testament to 1000mile socks that I was wearing for the Great North Run but had not got on last night. Must invest in more 1000mile socks.

I have decided to increase the distances that I am running because I have now set my sights on a full marathon at some point in 2010 and I have half a mind on tacking an ultra marathon at some point in the future too.

I gave myself a full week off to recover from the Great North Run and by the end of the week I was starting to really need to do something again. I could almost feel my muscles starting to atrophy while I sat there playing the playstation.

Saturday was a light run with the wife. My old favourite route of 4.2miles took us about 50 minutes which was a slow pace but I didn’t want to push too hard straight after my little rest.

Sunday I got the bike out for the cardio. Went out for an hour and a half and covered about twenty miles. A week after a half marathon and my legs were not back up to full capacity, after about an hour I had burned through the glycogen stores, the last 5 miles home were slow and painful.

Over the weekend I also had a chance to chat with Nigel, my proposed crewmate for the DW, he is finding it hard to keep up with any kind of training regime with his workloads at the moment, and his getting married next year is putting further strains on his time and wallet so he has decided to pull out of any plans to take part in the DW next year. So what to do? Find a replacement? Do the single crew event? Postpone until 2011? I’m not sure at the moment.

I’m also thinking about changing the name and the URL of the blog (be warned that some day soon I might move). When I first started this, the only reason for it being was to chart my preparations to get ready for the Devizes to Westminster canoe race but now it has become more like a fitness diary. I don’t know what to change it to yet but I might even give the page a full makeover.

I have had ten days of forced rest because of these bloody legs of mine. I have two weeks to go before this Great North Run and the shin pain has morphed into something more painful now.

My shin splints pain feels like the shin bone is going to snap. This pain has gone from both my legs, I am no longer suffering from this probably because I have rested. I now have a stabbing pain that is centred in the middle of my left leg (right leg is fine) deep in the muscle. It’s okay at rest but if I move the leg it really hurts and running is difficult.

I went off to have my gait looked at to see if this is the root of my leg problem. There is a specialist running shop nearby which have a treadmill/camera/laptop combo to analyse your running gait. One cause of shin pain is overpronation, where your foot rolls inward too much. My internet diagnosis had me suspecting that I might overpronate but after a quick jog on the treadmill in a pair of neutral trainers that was ruled out. I have a neutral gait and am a forefoot striker. The landing on my forefoot I knew about but I was pleased to see I have a good running cycle.

I have now invested in a new pair of trainers that cushion the forefoot and they have made a marked improvement in comfort while running. I went out for a light run (50 minutes) and was surprised with how much I needed cushioning at the front of my foot.

So now I am on countdown. 5 days until the Great North Swim. 13 days until the Great North Run. I am starting to get a touch nervous about both.

I think there might have been a false dawn regarding the shin splints.

Last night I went out for a quick run; a short 3 miler and I was out for not more than 35 minutes, but the pain in my shins is back with a vengeance.
To make matters worse, the change in gait that I have been experimenting with is putting pressure on other bits of me and I ended up with really bad back pain while I was running as well.

I’m at a bit of a loss really. Short term I am going to have to rest again which isn’t really good for the final build up for the Great North Run, long term I think I am going to have to get a professional to look at why this is persisting. Dr. Internet is not up to muster on this one.

Last week when I was out on my bike I found a great launch point for the kayak, and with the weather looking good I decided to go for a paddle.

It was a solo effort and I focused on improving my paddling technique and in theory my overall speed. I had done a bit of research online about how to improve my stroke and wanted to put some of the pointers in practice. All told, I think I was paddling better.

The trip was 10 miles of river which I covered in just a few minutes over two hours. I probably could have been quicker but at the Montford Island I went down the wrong channel and ended up grounding on a shallow stretch that kept me busy for about 20 minutes before I was able to re-float. I did forget my iPod so I was going a bit stir crazy towards the end. This was a two hour stint and I was getting a bit bored, I’ll need a fully charged iPod for the DW race methinks.

Sunday was time for me to try out the Kinesio tape and see if this remedy really solves muscular skeletal injuries or is just a gimmicky dupe. The tape itself seems to be some kind of strong medical type, and the adhesive has swirls in it to encourage lymph movement and to courier away sweat. Whenever a product (especially applied externally) claims to encourage things like lymph transit, I get a bit dubious but my shin pain has been debilitating of late and I was prepared to give it a go.

For this injury I found a video on the Runners World website which shows how to self apply the tape. The tape wraps under the sole of my foot from the inside edge to the outside edge, and then up my shin to the point of the pain. A strip of inflexible duct tape is applied over the kinesio tape underneath to support the arch of my foot, and that’s it, done.

I have also been investigating running technique and it seems my tip toe running is ideal for sprinters, but puts immense pressure on the shin when running long distance. So I have now started to use my whole foot when I land, still touching down with my toes but letting my heel fall and take some of the impact as well.

The run on Sunday was going to be a half hour 3 mile jog to test both running technique and Kinesio tape. Three miles is usually enough trigger off the shin pain. I was feeling good about the run at the turn around point though, so I kept going. In the end I completed 6.7 miles in 64 minutes.

I did have a couple of twinges of pain in my shins while running, but nothing compared to the crippling pain I usually get and in the end it was joggers nipple that was the most painful injury I sustained.

I have kept the tape on. That seems to be the difference between kinesio tape compared with other therapeutic sport strapping, you keep the tape in place for several days. It feels a bit strange with support under my foot but I think it is doing some good.

There is an argument that this seemingly miraculous cure for my shin splints is placebo, or maybe it is because I have changed my running style and I am just attributing the improvement to the tape. One day I might test the tapes abilities more scientifically but I am going to keep using it in the build up to the Great North Run and almost certainly during the half marathon itself.

Reading in all the information for the GNR it says that by now I should be able to run 8 miles with ease as part of my ongoing training program, and if I can’t do that I should consider deferring my place till next year.
If I was completely truthful about my ongoing training I would probably say that I should defer, I can’t recall a single training session which has covered 8 miles.
I don’t intend on deferring though. I know I can cover that distance without dying, hell I know I can cover the full half marathon distance in a satisfactory time, and I am a much more accomplished runner than I was way back in March when I completed the Ironbridge Half, my only problem is my shin pain the following morning after a big session and I am going to take steps to address this with Kinesio taping (when the tape arrives) and by adjusting my running gait (with some limited success so far).

With all that said though I do think I need to focus 100% on this half marathon now. Every email and press release I read that I should respect the challenge of the GNR, and so far I haven’t.

Last night after work I ran the Wrekin. This is the same route as I had taken on Friday night where I run around the back of the hill, up the steep side and then over the top following the main route back to the car park. The route is about 4 miles long and climbs up about 1,300ft. I wanted to nick a minute or two off Friday’s time of 43 minutes.

I set off at a solid pace and all was going fine until I hit the steep section. There were a couple of people climbing up that bit too and as I ran past them I knew I was doomed. This section reduced me to a walk last time, and I knew it would this time but now that there was an audience I ran for longer than maybe I should have. When I did finally have to stop running I was buggered. I felt a bit sick (I’ve never run myself so hard that I thought I would be sick before) and had a horrible stitch and as a result the people I jogged past nearly caught me up. More haste less speed and all that.

After I reached the top it was a quick jog back to the bottom and was relatively easy as gravity did most of the work. All in I did it in pretty much the same time as Friday. So much for going faster.

It’s been a little while since I did anything as far as the training is concerned, wedding anniversary and my ongoing struggle with painful shins has had me sitting on the sidelines a little bit. However I planned a weekend of effort to get me back on course.

Friday night I kicked off with a run around and up the Wrekin. From the gate, climbing slowly around the back of the Wrekin followed by the brutal uphill section that I attacked with gusto but soon reduced me to a walk, then to the top for 30 seconds to take the view in before a casual run to the bottom. All in, was 43 minutes and some seconds.

With my swim across Windermere looming large on the calendar I thought I should prepare for this a little bit for it. I’m a good swimmer, certainly I am a much better swimmer than runner. When I first signed up for the Great North Swim I could cover the total distance pretty easily in the pool and since my first initial swims I decided to focus on my weak event of running.
I did have a nagging concern that I haven’t yet swum outdoors, nor have I really swum in a wetsuit as I will be on the day.

So after some initial research into where I could swim outdoors I found Hanmer Mere. A beautiful lake about twenty miles away from home. The Outdoor Swimming Society said that the water was clean and free from boats and fishing. Sounded ideal.

We arrived at the sleepy village of Hanmer at about 7am, and after initially chickening out of the whole thing because I didn’t want to stroll around the village looking like a penguin sponsored by RipCurl, I did in the end step into the water.

Wading in there was some horrible weeds just under the water which tangled my legs to start with and that pretty much set me up for some paranoid swimming, I kept checking my legs hadn’t tangled some unknown object, and kept peering into the dark water to try and identify what unseen creatures were lurking below the water level.

The water was cold but the wetsuit took the chill out of it and I didn’t really notice the temperature while I was encased in neoprene (getting changed back into clothes on the bank was a shivery affair despite the sun though).

In the pool I have perfected quite an aggressive swimming technique plunging underwater and using every last muscle to whip my speed up. Outdoors, in a wetsuit, stalked by unknown aquatic predators, I lost some of my confidence and nothing above my chin went under water. Strange underwater currents sometimes took some of the power from my stroke (giving a feeling not unlike slipping off a kerb) and wind blown waves would slap me in the face, all of which made me a bit pensive.

By the time I was back on shore I was exhausted, the combination of physical exertion and adrenaline really wore me out. I enjoyed it, and am looking forward to the great north swim, though I am hoping the proximity of the other swimmers will alleviate my worries. I don’t think I am cut out for outdoor swimming as a rule though.

But wait, that’s not all. There was still Sunday. Keen to keep building on the weekends efforts I unloaded the bike and set off for a good solid ride.

I headed off to see the sights of Shropshire. I didn’t really have any idea where I was going, I just went where I fancied. I took in some of the most beautiful bits of this county and at some point dropped onto a section of the National Cycle Network route 81. I had no idea until now that this existed but it was great. Really nice roads, mostly free from traffic, the signs were easy to follow, and looking at the website there are loads of these routes all over the place. I covered 19.4 miles in an hour and a half and had one of the best outings for a while.

And finally, I was watching the World Athletics championships last night and noticed that one of the athletes had quite heavy strapping on their legs and wondered if strapping could help my shin splints problem that takes me out of training every couple of weeks. So as always I turn to Dr. Internet to see what I can find, and I discovered Kinesio Taping and also a strapping technique for Shin Splints. This tape is designed to breath and move and act like skin while at the same time supporting the muscle structure. It is designed to stay on for days at a time to aid in recovery as well as supporting during exercise. This shin pain is really annoying me, and if Kinesio taping is good enough for world athletes, I’m game to give it a go.

Another lunch time dash. Today I intended to go just that little bit further and just that little bit faster.

I let my mind wonder while I am running, it roams all over the place covering subjects like my workload, the playstation, the pain of blisters, and contemplating whatever might be on my iPod at the time. Whenever I get particularly involved in a chain of thought I tend to slow down. So today I tried to think about running faster, and whenever I realised that I had slackened my pace I would push a bit harder.

Net result, exactly 5 miles in 41 minutes and 19 seconds.

Going back to that calculator thing, at that pace I would be now doing the half marathon in 1 hour and 54 minutes.

Okay, so that is only a couple of minutes faster but it proves that if I don’t daydream while I’m running and just remember to run fast, I can improve my speed and time.

Anyway, while we are here, have the predicted times based on today’s effort.

1500m 6:58
the mile 7:30
3000m(3k) 14:31
3200m(about 2 miles) 15:33
5000m(5k) 24:57
8000m(8k) 41:04
5 miles 41:19
10,000m(10k) 52:01
ten miles 1:26:09
a half marathon 1:54:41
a marathon 3:59:07

Just got back from a lunchtime run which I had to get in as I have plans for dinner tonight but still wanted to get some kind of exercise in today. I usually spend my lunch breaks reading a book but the run to the town centre and back was much more satisfying.

I did another 4.2 miles. It seems I am destined to run 4.2 miles. I didn’t pick a particular route, I just set off from work and ran and roughly aimed my circular route back to base at about the 15-20 minute mark, and 4.2 miles is the outcome.

The distance was achieved in 34.52. and then while trying to find out if that pace is any good I found this neat calculator on Runners world which tells you what sort of time you would manage different distances.

Here’s what I got.

1500m - 7:04
the mile - 7:37
3000m(3k) - 14:44
3200m(about 2 miles) - 15:47
5000m(5k) - 25:20
8000m(8k) - 41:41
5 miles - 41:57
10,000m(10k) - 52:49
ten miles - 1:27:27
a half marathon - 1:56:26
a marathon - 4:02:45

1:56:26 half marathon… Not very impressed with that actually. Although it is below my 2 hours and 6 minutes from the last time I did a half, this time predictor can’t be taking into account increasing exhaustion. I would say that at this pace I am slower than I was all the way back in March.

Must work on upping my speed… Come to think of it I need to up the distances I am running too.

I think it’s fair to say that this Saturday training with my dad was the hardest I have done to date. Bearing in mind that I had run up the Wrekin on Thursday night I wasn’t exactly over the moon when I was told that we would be doing more hill work.

There is a flight of steps in the town park which are about 150 metres long. The steps themselves are spaced a little over a metre apart and each rise is a half buried railway sleeper. From the top of the steps there is a nice bow shaped, gentle slope down which takes you back to the bottom of the steps.

After half a mile run in we got to the steps. We then upped the speed and powered up the steps. They are spaced just close enough to be able to take each step in a bound but to be able to do so, you need to keep the momentum up so for the entire flight of steps I was at a near sprint.

I took the heart rate monitor this weekend and long before I hit half way up it started to urgently beep that my heart was about to explode (It still thinks that I am 70 years old so whenever my heart rate hits 170bpm or higher it panics) getting to the top on the first run my heart rate hit 220bpm.

We had a nice slow jog back down to the bottom, only for me to be told that we were going to do this five more times.

Second run up was hard, heart rate nearly as high legs starting to hurt.
Third run was a crippler, chest felt restricted, breathing was hard. Heart rate monitor was taken off to take the load of my chest. Legs agony. Jog down reduced to walking pace.
Fourth run I was hurting. I could no longer bound up the stairs one at a time and had to reduce my stride length.
Fifth run. Legs burning, chest hurting, short stride length needed a few minutes at the top to recover. The shin splint pain cam back and was forced to hobble for a bit.
Sixth was where I broke myself. I was reminded of the mile long portage in the DW race and I was spurred on for one last push. Full sprint, massive stride length, screaming agony. I got to the top absolutely fucked. It felt as though someone had replaced my lungs for molten lava, but that was nothing compared to the pain in my lower legs. The half mile run out was a horrible half jog half hobble.

I then rested for the rest of the weekend and my shins still hurt today, I might take the bike out for some cardio tonight but I’m going to not run for a couple of days.

Yesterday I declared I wanted to beat my pb time of 0.35.50 from the gate at the bottom of the Wrekin, to the trig point at the top, and back again. The distance of the route is 2.7 miles climbing 1,335ft. I had actually set my sights on a sub thirty minute time.

The weather was pretty grotty, rain and close cloud, but it served to keep me cool so was probably a blessing in disguise. I set off, and remembered the first time I had run this there was the wall that we hit at two minutes of jogging, I was starting to tire at two minutes again but there was no wall this time.

At about 7 minutes I was past halfway house and although I was breathing hard, my CV was strong. My lover calves were suffering though and I was forced run at a slower pace all the way to the top. It took me 19 minutes to get to the trig point.

I had a quick 30 second breather and then set off as fast as possible to the bottom. Running uphill I was slowed by muscle fatigue, but for whatever reason all aches disappeared and I was able to run at full pelt, I had to put the brakes on a bit though otherwise I would have fallen.

Rounding the corner below halfway house (which according to google maps is 0.4 miles to the gate) I looked at my watch and saw that I was at 29 minutes. I threw all fears of a turned ankle to the wind, and sprinted.

Final time, 30m 55s. A new pb for running the Wrekin but even so, I was a bit disappointed. 290 days worth of training to shave off just 5 minutes from my time.

Getting to the bottom my calves were done, the back of them hurt as though they had been smacked a few times with a cricket bat. I blame the three days of running without rest as the reason for the total leg exhaustion. I also developed a bit of a hacking cough and am even now coughing up sticky spit. I slept like a rock last night and loads of muscles ache today, the run up the hill has all of my core muscles and my shoulders aching as well as the legs.

Tuesday night went for a casual jog with the wife around the 4.2 mile route. It took a little over an hour as we walked and ran at various stages. It also started to rain at the end which was not so pleasant.

Wednesday night I did the same route, this time by myself. 4.2 miles in 38 minutes averaging 6.6 mph. happy with that sort of speed. That’s about the two hour mark for the half marathon.

Tonight (weather permitting) I am planning on running up and down the Wrekin in a revisit of my first training effort 290 days ago. (I can’t actually believe I have been going at this for 290 days). My first attempted dash up and back down the Wrekin with Nigel was achieved in 43 minutes and 20 seconds and the amount of pain involved made me realise at the time how unfit I was. I have since managed a personal best for the Wrekin run of 35 minutes 50 seconds and I intend to smash that tonight.

I have nine weeks before I have the Great North Run and I would like to get a couple of full 13 mile distances under my belt before then. I am planning on getting dropped off at a location 13 miles away from home and then running back back. Llanymynech is favourite at the moment being 13.7 miles away. Might go this weekend, other commitments pending.

I went for Saturday training with my dad again and this weekends training word is Fartlek. It’s a training method devised for the Swedish cross country team in the 1930’s. It means speed play, and is a variation on interval training. Basically you go for a run, then at some point you increase the speed to elevate the cardio to bursting point and then slow it down to a normal run to recover. It was quite good fun, hard work but enjoyable. We ran for 28 minutes around a route that was in the region of 3 miles.

I hadn’t planned to do anything on Sunday, but after spending the afternoon at a barbeque with fantastic weather I decided to take the bike out for a ride. I didn’t really plan to do anything to exotic, just a nice 10ish mile route that I have taken a few times. I am already getting faster as my muscles get used to cycling, I can sustain a higher gear for longer and spend more time in top gear on straight roads.

Monday morning before work I chucked in a quick half an hour run. I was pressed for time as I didn’t decide to go running until I only had half an hour left before I had to get ready for work, so I chose a short route of 3.7 miles. I had half a mind thinking about Saturdays training with my dad and tried to push myself with this fartlek method. I would pick a couple of lamp posts and run flat out between them, and then run at normal pace to recover.
I don’t know if it was this fartlek running or the fact that I was running to a deadline, but I clocked in a healthy average speed of 6.9mph.

The weekend has left me pretty bushed.
Saturday it was early morning interval training with my dad. My dad is of the old school of training regimes. Whereas I like to try and find the latest scientifically proven techniques to get fitter, my dad quotes Roger Bannister’s training routine from the 1950’s. Basically it involves pain. We had a quick jog of about half a mile to the athletics track as a warm up, then ran 400m circuits in 90 seconds or less (which I think is about 9 – 10mph) which is pretty fast, not a sprint but close on. After a 400m circuit we had a couple minutes break, before doing it again. Sounds easy? I thought so.

400m is a horrible distance. Anaerobic respiration seems to kick in at about 200/300 metres so the final straight has everything hurting. Two minutes is enough to allow the breath and heart rate recover but the muscles don’t get back to 100%, so then the next circuit around is just that little bit harder, the thigh ache just increases each time round. It also doesn’t help that my dad seems to run faster than me, (and I also think we were racing each other a bit) so I was always pushing myself faster than I would have been comfortable with.

The plan was to do the same as Banister did when he was training to break the 4 minute mile (though he was doing his circuits in sub 60 seconds not 90s) which was ten circuits of the 400m track with a 2 minute break each lap. We managed four before we could take no more. I am going to do this again next weekend though (with five circuits in mind), it is something different to my usual training and everyone says that variety is the route to improvement.

Sunday I was going to go for a cycle but I had tickets to Silverstone so I cancelled. But then by the time I got back from the race track there was still plenty of light left in the day so I did take the bike out after all. I cycled to Nigel’s which is 21 miles away and it took me a couple of minutes over an hour and a half to get there which was a reasonable pace.

For old times sake I suggested we head to the Wrekin and then I had the intention of heading off home from there as it was a few miles in the right direction for me. (In the end, the day was running out and I feared some rain clouds that were forming so I got a lift back home leaving my bike at Nigel’s, with the intention of collecting it after work at some point this week).

There are some pretty cruel hills between Nigel’s house and the Wrekin. Slight gradients up for miles on end. I found it hard but glanced over my shoulder to see that Nigel was falling away. I hate having to re-start cycling uphill so I just carried onward to the top where I could stop, by the time Nigel caught up he was exhausted and the Wrekin was still miles away.

Heading up into a little village the road got so steep that we both had to dismount. Nigel was first to fail, but I didn’t make it much further before I could go no more. The thing was, in our youth we used to both be able to make it up to the top. Nigel blamed his advanced years, I blame lack of exercise. Getting to the top we were rewarded with some pretty exciting downhill sections though and this is why I love the Wrekin. Twisting technical tarmac roads all of which we sped at 30+ mph, exhilarating stuff.

The ride back to Nigel’s house was hard work, especially for Nigel. He had to stop a few times, and was complaining of pains down his legs that sound exactly like the Shin Splints I suffered with a while ago while running, he also complained about his thigh muscles hurting.

When I chose my bike I wanted it to be able to cover distances and maintain a high speed. These are things that Nigel’s bike isn’t designed to do. He has a mountain bike with high rolling resistance and little aerodynamic efficiency. Towards the end of the ride I did an experiment with both of us coasting downhill at the same speed, when I released my brakes I accelerated away while Nigel either was slowing down or at least not getting any faster.

To the Wrekin and back was 13 miles and I think it was a bit of a surprise to Nigel for how tough it was. It was always going to be harder for Nige on the mountain bike though. He did kindly drop me back off home and I have to admit that I was thankful for the save of the ride because my legs were tired too.

I also have a new injury. I’m going to sound like some kind of hypochondriac, checking online for any ache and pain and then coming back with some fancy name for my new injury but I don’t think I am one, I just sound like it.

This week it is ulnar neuritis at the wrist, or handlebar palsy. It is pain in my little finger and my ring finger. I was surprised to find that this injury is quite common. I thought I had knocked my hand or something and was going to find hundreds of different references when I did internet research on it. Instead I found quite a specific reference to pain caused by holding the outside of the drop handlebars of a bike (which is my favorite riding position). The fix seems pretty simple. Adjust my seating position, hold the bars differently, strengthen core muscles.

I have loads of blisters on my feet today, at least one per toe, nasty ones, one is a blood blister! I don’t really know what caused them, I went for a run as normal, I was wearing the same clothes and shoes but something caused the skin on my feet to get abused. I might blame the temperature as it was the hottest day so far yesterday but I’m not convinced by that idea, maybe my feet have gone a bit nesh.

Anyway, standard 3.9 miles, covered in 42 minutes. Average speed of 5.6mph. This is also a concern. When I cycled to my parents my dad had just got back from a run and had managed 8 miles in just under an hour. That is the sort of speed I want to be doing if I am going to get anywhere near my target for the Great North Run. So yesterday I tried to push myself to go faster than I have been and all I managed to do is go slower than the last time I ran that distance. Why could I not go any faster? I thought I was pushing!

I could blame my blisters but they didn’t really hurt until the last half a mile. I could blame the heat I suppose but again, I didn’t really feel too wasted by the heat certainly not until the end. With that sort of speed though I would finish a half marathon in about two and a half hours. 30 minutes slower than I managed before I did any training. How wrong is that!

Actually I could blame the fact that I cycled 60 miles on the weekend. Maybe that’s it. Maybe I could do with a day off to recover. Though that doesn’t account for the blisters.