Author: Buck

I did my long awaited test half marathon on Sunday. I larded up and rested for two days beforehand to give myself the best possible shot at it. It was windier than I would have liked, and by an ironic bit of bad timing, Garmin (my gps sports watch) are having issues. The first time I’ve noticed any problem in 11 years of running and it’s on an important test run. Typical. The problem seems to be the live pace indicator. One second it’s telling you you are running too slow, then next too fast. Not ideal when you are trying to pace at your limit for 13 miles. Anyway, I’ve checked everything in every way I can think of, and although the live pace is all over the place, the distance is exactly accurate, and even when glitching my watch can tell the time, so the overall time for my half should be right. My last half was 1.29:19 (and that was a huge PB) I ran this one in 1.26:44! I was happy with that. It vindicates Camille’s plan. I’ve only been on the plan 7 weeks and I’ve absolutely smashed my PB. Then I wanted to know where that puts me in the grand scheme of things. Is that good? I googled “what is a fast time for a half marathon?” and this was my first result: That’s age on the left, then the columns are Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced and World Record. According to that I’m 8 minutes into Elite territory! Which to me means the chart is wrong or the bar is set low at my age. I was clicking through some other data on my watch and I came across this: Again, I was suspicious, and had no point of reference, so I googled it. According to that, I’m in the excellent range for an 18-25 year old man! Hang on a minute, am I getting good? I had a thought and looked where my newfound pace would place me, on the basis of last year’s Warrington half marathon. The Warrington half has the cantilever bridge and a some long, dragging hills, so it’s not a given, but if I could hold my current PB, that would put me in the top 20, and a podium for my age group! It’s all pie in the sky at the moment, but I put on Twitter “Got to be said though, I much prefer working towards results, rather than half-arseing a finish.” That thought kept playing on my mind. The Warrington half is in 10 weeks, so I can train for the hills a bit. But if I was to continue training, next year I could be top 10 overall! I really, really, like that thought. Old, useless, duffer me, actually in the mix! I’ve decided to postpone the 100 mile run for next year. That is just too long. It would take me years to get in contention for that. It would just be aiming for […]

We’ve had a few things going on. I was worried about Wendy, she’s been having small coughing bouts every day for over a year. Then I read on Twitter that one of the after effects of Long Covid is pulmonary fibrosis, a stiffening of the lungs that reduces function until death. That is less than ideal. I nagged Wendy into going to see the doctor, who referred her for a lung x-ray. The good news is they’ve said there is no apparent issue, case closed, so she’s not going to die. The bad news is the implied “suck it up” medical advice for her ongoing cough. Meh. We took a mini break to north Wales. It was only 4 days, and it was only 50 minutes away, but it was a complete change of scene and felt like a proper break. I got to do some “Chariots Of Fire” running. And we went to Bodnant Gardens again. Always lovely. When we came back I was surprised to be back on 2 shifts a week. I thought work had picked up. I asked and they have a definite start date now. The automated sorting machinery is running in the morning and evening as they ease the new tech in, but the whole thing goes properly live on the 25th of July. Then it will be all hands to the pumps. I can enjoy the last few quiet weeks now I have a set date. I’ll be a sad panda when I’m trying to fit my training in around full time work again. Money or leisure. It’s an either/or thing. Training is going well. Sort of. I was very bored with Camille’s plan, it was too easy and too repetitive. Get up, run 8 miles, easy, then go to work. 6 days a week. OK, it’s not quite that dull. Long run one day, specialist training (hills, sprints, etc) one day, but mainly it’s 8 miles, easy. It was boring. Then I was talking to someone on Twitter and he said about running from one end of one of my run loops (Carr Mill Dam, St Helens) to the end of another of my run loops (Wigan, where the old canal meets the Mersey). He’d run it one end to the other. Being me, I decided to run it as a loop. 31 miles. Basically it was all the dumb I swore I’d never do again after reading that article. I hadn’t trained for it, was winging it, all attitude and no preparation. I set off in my ASICS (the trainers that were rubbing so badly I ended up buying a bunch of new pairs. They have been alright on shorter runs, but you can see where this is going) wearing a running vest stuffed with 2½ litres of water and energy powder. There’s an extra 6 pounds of weight. On a hot day. I was cruising for 20 miles, (which, by no coincidence, is about the distance of my long runs […]

I’ve been following Camille’s plan and it’s starting to make sense. 6 days a week running, loads of tedious “8 miles, easy” nothing much challenging. But as I’m getting into the plan (6 weeks) I’m noticing the “8 miles easy at 8.30” are changing to “easy at 8.15” and shortly “easy at 8.00”. If I do every 8 mile at the suggested pace for that week, I can see how that would work. It’s still not very challenging, but this week my long run, instead of being a tedious “18 miles, super easy” is 18 miles; 11 at 7.45, then 7.00, 6.55, 6.50, 6.45, 6.45, finishing with an 8.00 for a cool down. 18 miles with 3 of the last 4 at sub 3 pace. That’s more like it! Next week will be the test. It’s my 7th week of this plan, and ends with me having to commit to one plan or the other for the final cycle of training. Instead of my long run next week I’m going to do a flat-out half marathon. See if this plan has made me faster. I was getting very bored with this plan. Get up, run 8 miles easy, go to work, repeat. I broke the plan and fell back into all the bad habits from before reading that article “why women are kicking arse at ultra events/ what men do wrong.” I did a 19 mile run up to Carr Mill dam. Someone on twitter was up there later that day so I said about it, he replied that he’d run from Carr Mill dam (the end of one of my run loops) to Wigan down the canal (the end of another of my loops). I fancied it. Instead of doing end to end I tried to do it as a loop. 31 miles. I’m only up to 19 miles in my training, and the plan said to do 18 that day. I was wearing my vest with bottles and bladder to support myself for the distance, it was well hot so my feet swelled with the heat and weight, and I was wearing my (tight) ASICS. It was basically as dumb as it’s possible to be. My nail got so bashed it blistered underneath and swelled up. I ran out of mojo at about 20 miles, was limping by 24, and quit at 29.6, had to shuffle home. Toe was very poorly. I tried another run but it was awful. Someone on twitter told me it was a blister under my nail, and best to pop it. That was a load better. I ended up clipping the nail back as far as I could and filing it smooth so it wouldn’t snag. I’ve just been for a fast 7 mile with 5x 100m sprints and it’s not swelled up and was fine on the run, so I’m hoping that’s that. The ultra runner on twitter said I was going to lose the nail, but that’s no big. The main […]

I’ve been in two minds about a bunch of things to do with my running lately. My main concern was with my knees. You always hear people saying running inevitably smashes your knees, and I was wondering if I was going that way. I overheard talk about two other drivers who had to have replacement knees and were in a right state. My mam has had it done and, after the pain of the operation and recovery, seems to be fine with it. But either way, you don’t want to be thinking you are hastening your knee destruction. Then there’s the stretching and cross training I’ve been doing on the rowing machine. Is that good or further stressing my knee? Should I rest until it’s completely better? I can see arguments for and against everything. Today I went to see my physio. He had a look at my knees and stretched and pulled me in every direction to pinpoint the problem. He said it was just inflamed tendons. Huge relief. While I was there I asked all the questions. Running smashes your knees? Exactly the opposite. The cartilage has no blood supply. The only way you can build and strengthen it is through movement and exercise. I said I was worried I was going to end up needing new knees. “If you stop running, and put on a lot of weight, you might need new knees in about 20 years. Maybe.” I asked about the stretching and he said it was fine. And he advised cross training (such as rowing, cycling or swimming) as it is low impact. Maybe not to close the angle of my knees as much on the rowing machine (stop before my heels meet my bum, sort of thing) but basically it’s all good. What about total rest? Absolutely not. It’s tendon damage and inflammation. Tendons have poor blood supply, so massage them and exercise them to stimulate blood flow to aid recovery. Also tendons fray when they are damaged. If you just rest they eventually repair, but messily. If you exercise they knit together tidily. So many good answers. He also had me doing eyes-shut one leg balancing. Then he was stretching my about. He said I had the responses of a 20 year old man. Apparently we old dodders are only able to hold 5 or 6 seconds, knee up, balancing on one foot with our eyes closed. A good 20 year can last 20 seconds. I do it every day (with my eyes open) as part of my post run stretching, so I aced that. More wobble getting settled on my right though, which is the worst knee, so it exposed the problem. Also the leg raises are supposed to be a problem past 70 degrees. I swing to head height daily as part of my warm down. He was well made up with me. He’s given me a bunch of stretches and exercises to add to my regime and told me to […]

It’s been an odd month. After the marathon I had 3 weeks of recovery training, then I started the Camille Herron training plan. I’ve been on that for 2 weeks. It’s the last day of May tomorrow, so it’s been a quiet month. I’m not sure about the new plan. It’s 6 days a week training, about 8 mile every day, with a specialist day (intervals or hills or whatever) midweek, the rest all easy runs (some with strides) and a long run at the end of the week. My problem with the plan (apart from having to get up to do an 8 mile run before and 11+ hour shift) is it just doesn’t feel like I’m pushing myself. With the Advanced Marathoning one you bloody well know you done a bit. It’s a 16 week plan so I don’t officially start it for another 5 weeks. I’m cycling through the first 7 weeks then I’ll do a test half marathon. If I’m making significant gains I’ll start from week 1 again. If not, switch back to AM, it’s brutal, but I know it works for me. Also I’ve got runner’s knee (I think). Just a general soreness under my kneecaps, mainly the right one. I’m going to see the physio next Monday. He said it sounds like an inflamed tendon. That sounds treatable. As someone on Twitter pointed out, whatever he advises, I’m best doing it immediately if I’m to have the best shot of recovery and still smashing my goal. I don’t like this limbo. I know all the pros do 80/20, and amazing times, but I just want to know I’m not losing all my fitness and speed. I’ve got an 8 mile progressive speed run (warm up for 20 minutes, 2 min at 8.45, 2 at 7.45, 2 at 6.45, 20 minutes cool down) on Thursday. I’m off work (so far). I might do 20 minutes, flat out 5K, 20 minutes. A 5K is not overly taxing on my body. I don’t know if it’s a fair test after 3 weeks light duties and 2 weeks easy training, but if I was faster I’d take it as a good sign, so early in the plan. I’ll see what Twitter thinks. Then do it anyway.