Monday, February 9, 2009

Week of 2/2 ; 11 weeks to go

Time to lower the mileage - shorter tempo, shorter mid week LR, shorter recoveries. Ran 487km in January which is a massive month for me ; like I said I may be paying the price with the calf soreness. Booked the flights the other day and got a great deal with Malaysian. In other good news, my company approved the business end of the trip so the week's stay in Philadelphia before the marathon is now officially a work week, but it also means they'll pay for transport, meals and hotel....

Monday: 7.82Km tempo @ 3:50 HR 168 Ca88 26° 84%RH SE6/9. Short tempo run on Matilda Bay paths. Will this humidity ever end ? It was very warm this morning considering  we started and were finished before sunrise. It was tough going at first ( I guess I had a tough weekend with the long run and probably 11 hours in the car all up), but it got better. Had a slight issue when I noticed the path was closed and I couldn't just go around the fence because of a 100m line of limestone blocks blocking the way onto the grass! Anyhow the run got better as I went on and finished pretty strongly feeling pretty good - I was cracking on a bit to make up for the slower start. All up 11.75km. Calf still a little sore...

Tuesday am: 9.59km recovery @ 4:42 HR 139 Ca 85 22° 93%RH SSE9/15. Another oppressive morning - very strange weather with misty clouds halfway up the Bankwest tower, quite beautiful towards the end with the sun breaking through and all the boats on the river - if it wasn't so freaking hot! Nice easy run around the Perth bridges with Sas - right calf still giving me problems. It's not sore as such but there is an achy feeling - possibly bruising from all the massage! I'll go to the physio if it doesn't improve soon. We'll see how it goes at intervals tonight...

Tuesday pm: WAMC Intervals. 3 x 1600m with 3:30 SR 25° 72%RH. Aim of the session was to increase the pace slightly over each. I usually find this kind of session less painful than the others and tonight was no exception. Decreased the lap average from 1:23.3 to 1:22.4 to 1:21.4 which was the goal. Times were 5:33.1, 5:29.7 and 5:25.6. The calf unfortunately behaved as expected and got a little tender and sore after the session, although it was fine in the warmup. Icing as I write this. Last time physio didn't really help ; I know what the issue is and will have to try and manage it as best I can. All up 9.6km.

Wednesday: 12.01 Recovery @ 4:43 HR 136 Ca 84 21° 73%RH S17/20. Ran E.Perth around Maylands Peninsula and back (map) with Sandgroper. Turned out lovely and cool this morning with the humidity finally dropping to manageable levels. Replaced the 3/4 length 6mm heel lift with the 1/4 length 4mm one in an effort to calm the calf down. Iced afterwards and it's not feeling too bad. Tomorrow's double will be a test because they are both pretty hard runs. Went for an hour cycle late morning.

Thursday am: 16.65km Easy @ 4:24 HR 141 Ca 86 18° 58%RH ESE20/28. Ran Mends St to UWA up the west perimeter path of KP, looped back along May Dr and back past Sticky beaks, then down Malcolm to Mends St. Lovely conditions this morning, including a helpful easterly for the run down to UWA. Didn't feel as cool as it should have but compared to the last ten days it was literally a breath of fresh air. Had a good run, the right calf soreness notwithstanding, and Sas had a good one too ; very happy about that. Seems the big weeks are agreeing with her - we're well on track for Boston.

Thursday pm: 9.59km MP @ 4:03 HR 159 Ca 87 26° 45%RH SSW43/52. Ran the bridges loop from Taylor St on a warm and windy afternoon. Elected to go towards the Narrows first to minimise the headwind. Was a bit worried about the calf before I started but in the end it was fine - going to the physio tomorrow anyway. Felt very good and only really felt the need to push in the last bit from the causeway back to Taylor St because of the strong wind. Again a bit quick, but I seem to be slotting into this pace pretty naturally.

Friday: Went to see my physio for a bit of massage and dry needling. Got some good twitches from the needles so hopefully with the day of rest things should start to improve. That's probably hopelessly optimistic... that pipelines gonna be fun tomorrow!

Saturday am: 33.23km Long run @ 4:43 HR 144 Ca84 12° 73%RH S17/24. Ran the pipeline (map) on an absolutely beautiful morning with S & S. Right calf was reeeaaally stiff at the start but it loosened up after  couple of k's - it definitely felt better going up than down but I'd all but forgotten about it coming down from Mundaring. Definitely did not feel as trashed on the run as last week and felt it was much easier than the last time I went out on the pipeline. It's a challenging run with a lot of ups and downs - around 450m of elevation gain I reckon. Stopped once at Fred Jacoby park for a gel and some water and again at Mundaring. Could probably lose the Jacoby one and take the gel on the go ; in my current delicate condition it's tough getting going again ; I felt fantastic just before I stopped.... and there's little point in carrying a water bottle for 33k if you're only going to drink at water taps! Looking forward to doing the choo-choo run next week (as featured in the Oct '07 edition of R4YL) , when another S may join us!

Saturday pm: 8k recovery @ 4:49 HR 141 Ca 82 24° 41%RH SSW36/46. Wow, that was interesting. Very tough to start with, although it did get easier. Happened upon Sas with 2.5km to go - having some company made it a little easier! Pretty warm (24) and windy (SSW35/46), not terrible but enough to make a hard run a little harder. The benefits of this workout are well publicised - looking forward to that because it's not an easy thing to do, so the payoff better be good!

Sunday 1pm: 10.5km recovery @ 4:39 HR146 Ca84 29° 26%RH ESE22/32. Decided to go out early to maximise recovery for tomorrow's tempo. Pretty hot and a little windy on the way home. Had real ups and downs on this run ; felt great and then felt really lousy, then felt good again... the good news is that for the last 3 k or so I couldn't feel any discomfort in the left leg - although it was very niggly at the start.

In summary, a good week with higher mileage than intended (128km!) because of the additional Saturday pm run and a longish recovery on Wednesday. The calf didn't get any worse, which is good and the fatigue levels are holding OK. I still have 'fresh' days and good runs which means the body seems to be handling things well for the time being - the HR and running economy indexes are also improving. Some runs feel tougher than the indicated HR, but thats fine. I just need to keep an eye on things and be honest with myself - this is the 5th 100km week in a row averaging just under 110.

3 comments:

Clown said...

Very impressive running, great month of Jan. Maybe just ease off a little on the speedwork while the calf is playing up, hope it sorts itself out quickly.

DC64 said...

I was very happy with the 1600's session yesterday because I felt it would place far less pressure on the injury than a set of 400's for example. JK must have known ;-) You're right - I have to be sensible here...

Biscuitman said...

Glad your calf held up for your long run. Didn't envy you going thru the dry needling.