Another quick catch-up of the week that was. Monday: First day of using the Garmin in anger, I used it on my morning run. Decided to do my longer loop to check it out as part of it has quite a bit of tree cover and so wanted to see how the GPS would react; not an issue, it never lost the signal once. I must say I'm impressed with how quickly it locates the satellites at start-up, I've read all sorts of comments that it can take two minutes or more. Well, I can honestly say it has never taken it more than 25 seconds to work out where we are which I don't think is an unreasonable time at all. Anyway, I had estimated the run to be around 4 to 4.5 miles because of how long it took me but according to the Garmin it's 5.03 miles so I'm well chuffed. Anyway, today's stats:
Name: Dump Loop (perhaps I need to think of a nicer name for what is a nice run)
Time: 49:25
Tuesday: Club night tonight, we did a recce of the race that they are hosting next week, the Roundway Chase. This is the club's biggest race of the year and one I was hoping to marshall at but we're on holiday next week so won't be around. The race starts with the hill that we did last week so it's a bit of a toughie. The rest of the race is around Roundway Down, very undulating with a couple of sneaky hills but the worst is the going underfoot. All the recent rain we have has turned the paths into a quagmire and, with around 100 runners expected, I dread to think what the course will look like when the race is over. I don't think anyone will be getting a personal best on this 10k! The recce was planned to be quite stop / start (as people were shown and explained their marshalling points) so I took Rommel with me and he loved it.
Wednesday: Did the dump loop again this morning, the poor dog was suffering on the run, I don't think he had enough recovery time overnight bless him. Anyway, I am finding the Garmin a real motivator (even though, at the minute, I am not using the virtual racing partner function) and really wanted to beat Monday's time. Today's results:
Name: Dump Loop
Time: 47:47
Very chuffed, managed to knock one and a half minutes off the run even though the going is getting worse every day due to the continuing rain.
Thursday: Interval night at the club once again and probably my favourite session by far. When the trainer told us it was going to be hill repeats, I just about died. Speed + Hills = Loathing. However, it turned out to be right up my street! The idea was to run a 50m uphill section as fast as possible and then run back down, quickly but in a controlled fashion. As there was six of us altogether, we did it in a relay style. Two people started at the top and ran down - the two people at the bottom then ran up and handed over to another couple who ran back down. The first couple then ran back up and so on and so forth. This meant that the repeats went rest, run uphill, rest, run downhill, rest and then repeat. It was a great session and I was finally able to hold my own against the lady who I was partnered with. I can tell how far I have improved in a relatively short time as a few weeks ago there is no way I could've kept up with her, let alone beat her several times. We didn't actually cover that much distance however my average heart rate was 145bpm including the rest breaks so I think that's pretty good.
Friday: Couldn't help myself, decided to do the dump loop once again to see if I could beat my Wednesday time! I ached quite a bit although not so much my legs as more my arms; I guess that's where I was pumping them to get up the hill yesterday. Today's results:
Name: Dump Loop
Time: 47:14
Woohoo, I have managed to shave 2 minutes off my time for the course this week!! See what I mean about the Garmin being a great motivator? Really am going to have to rethink the dog situation though, I'm getting fed up with having to stop to let him catch up. I think he's really overdone it this week, I guess Staffies aren't really built for speed and stamina. He's fine on the grass sections, but as 50% of the run is track, he's just not coping.
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