Sunday 11th - Friday 16th November

Training Report:

Having run so well in the race on Saturday, I woke up Sunday morning feeling washed out and exhausted. I had to flake out of my planned long run and went back to bed. I'd learnt my lesson from my summers fatigue syndrome and was content to take the day off, I was due one on Monday anyway so I just decided to switch the days around. I also managed to not feel the strange guilt that hits you if you miss a session and was happy to sleep it off until late in the afternoon!

I knew I'd done the right thing as I was back to my old self on Monday. My hour and forty minute run came and went. I was pleased with the continued improvement of my concentration levels. I was focused purely on my running for the majority of that time, instead of going into dream world fantasising about Olympic glory and chocolate cake!

For Tuesday's track session I was interested to see how my legs would deal with a speed session only twenty four hours after running sixteen plus miles on them. I was pleasantly surprised. We were set 5 x 1000 metres and again we set faster lap times for the first and last reps to recreate a race tempo. Having hit the faster first rep splits I slowly sped up during the session until I was running close to the times of my supposed faster rep. I'd made a rod for my own back as my coach took delight in demanding that I was at least 2 seconds a lap quicker for the final go. I was pleased to run 2 and a half seconds quicker for him!

Although I had a race on Saturday I decided to keep my training load high. I wanted to see if I could deal with running on tired legs any better than I'd done three weeks ago. So I kept the quality and quantity high. Two ten mile runs on Wednesday, one with a twenty minute fast tempo run shoved in the middle. I did three sessions on Thursday, two relaxed forty minute runs and a hill session. Friday was a very easy thirty minutes and a ten minute jog with some strides. And I was ready to see how my legs would cope...