Daz Does Tri

Steady 10k at just outside 7/mm today.  Looks good on the tin but legs are still smashed and I feel double tired.  Good news that 7s felt like walking but I really need the old bones to start feeling better to push on tomorrow. Not a horrendous week so far - 33 miles bagged so should just about hover around 40 with some quality in there.  Ideally I'll get 2 x track in next week and a Parkrun but we'll see how the legs are handling things.

As holiday season finishes upyesterday was really day 1 of autumn training.  Time to get consistent. Things are pretty good, I'd say off last weekend I'd be fairly confident of going 16.45 in an evening 5k.  Still, fucking long way to go !!!

After Thursday's tough session, the legs were pretty battered on Friday for an easy 4 mile spin out.  HR was lunar, think it hit 160 bpm for 7.30/mm at one stage.  Decided to hit Great Denham Parkrun on Saturday for a hard workout. The plan was see how the start went and if OK push on, if not just try and do some productive efforts.  Off to Venice in the afternoon (see what I did with the title!) so wanted something banked in case I didn't do much whilst away.

Session today, first 'proper' session on the new plan.  A 1,500m winter special from the days I was one of Ken Leader's Red and Gold army! 12 x 400m off 30 seconds recovery. 

Plan today was 5 progressive. Olden days Daz would have started around 7/mm and pushed down to 5/mm by then end with last bit practically flat out.  Finish feeling fresh as a daisy and ready to go hard the next day. The old body doesn't hold up to that any more.  Started around 7.30/mm and pushed down to 6:45/mm with an easyish last mile.

Been away at the holiday home for a couple of weeks.  It's my favourite place in the world to train. Quiet trails, a near 800m lake loop & no wifi !! Long story short, week 1 started to feel like I was really getting somewhere.  Hit Swindon parkrun on the second Saturday thinking I could go sub 17 and boom, legs just felt completely flat. Could not push pace, couple that with a Garmin signal problem (7/mm for first few hundred meters slowly reducing to a 5.37 first mile), a hilly course and the head went and it was barely a threshold effort at 18.13 (they messed up the winners time and gave him 2nd place so officially it was 18.25 which 5th place got lol). I ran 17.51 for 5k of my 0.45m on / off alternate laps on the Wednesday before which was a 5 mile session!

Wow, last couple of days have been tough.  Last nights run was supposed to be on the harder side of steady but just couldn't get the legs into it.  Finished up with 6.5 @ 7:26/mm - HR was crazy low but perceived effort was high.  This mornings run was another slog 8:34/mm - not sure the first couple of miles was accurate - but on the plus side legs felt slightly less fucked up at the finish than the start!  Will probs try and plod same again later.