ready to rumble

ok so lets cover what we did in last nights session first. four times one mile off a short recovery times recorded were 5:36 a slow cautious start, 5:21, equalling my best time around that circuit, 5:28 and 5:30 both times around about average, leading my coach to observe that i could be the start of the show come saturday. i just hope he hasn't put the kiss of death on it by saying that. i was pleased with last nights session as i don't very often run that well at aztec west.

moving ahead to saturday the requirements are:-

1 first place for one of the bristol teams

2 second place for the other bristol team

3 me to run the fastest leg of the day and anchor bristol to glory, just catching the other guy on the final corner.

4 bristol to thrash bath by 100 points in the european cup quater final at the recreation ground.

5 rampant bristol city to go top of the table beating hapless promotion rivals notts forest 10-0 in front of 20,000 delirious spectators at ashton gate, with scott murray claiming a hat trick

does that sound like too much. i hope not, but seriously for the 2.995 mile (thats 4.8k) course i would like to go under 17 minutes or there abouts. do that and i will be happyy with my days work

rest rest rest

steady run today, two steady runs yesterday. only one more interval session left before we move on to the big race on saturday with preparations starting to wind down and making sure our legs are fresh is now the top priority. no amount of training tomorrow night will make a huge amount of difference to our speed it is all about maintainng what we have and making sure that all the fine tuning is done so that we are in shape to qualify two teams for the national championships and that we are the first 'a' and 'b' teams ahead of tipton wells city harriers and notts ac. they are the only ones that will pose a significant threat to us apart from may be stroud now that commonwealth marathon bronze medalist dan robinson has resigned his tipton second claim membership and decided to run for his local team.

yesterdays bath half marathon produced some very fast times with ethiopian tewodros shiferaw running a course record 62 mins some thing while paulas best buddy liz yelling ran another course record 69:28 which i think puts her in the top ten of the world rankings for this year so far. so it was a very expensive day for the orgainisers having to shell out a total of £5400 in prize money and bonuses just for those two alone. i have no sympathy for those people though. when you look at how much money they charge to get huge amounts of people in to these events and compare the prize money they give out you have to ask the question... is it really mass participation or mass income generation?

looking further ahead,my coach mike said to me on saturday that he felt i wass in for a really good summer this year and i really hope he doesn't tempt fate by saying that because i know he wouldn't say that unless he felt that it was true. we weren't quite sure what distance to target but we were thinking along the lines of 800's 1500's and 3000's with the odd 400 thrown in for a bit of speed work. he also said that he thought that the reason why i struggled so much last year was that i (or raather my body) was still really getting used to being a runner and it is the faster stuff that takes more getting used to. interesting opinion because i think in the summer before last i was a new runner so therefore improvements were inevitable. interesting opinion and i have a real positive vibe about this summer already in more ways than one because the weather is looking so good and i think its going to be really good weather wise as well as in terms of times. the weather will i think be better than last years as well aparently last summer was the hottest since records began although i would be intrigued to know how they worked that one out as i can think of several years that i recall being hotter than last year was. hot weather means fast times as well....

a bad day at the office

As i mentioned in my previous post it was just me and craig peters for this afternoons session and as it turned out we both ran an well below par. he was timed at 11:48 his best is 11:26 and i was timed at 13:36 11 seconds down on my best. i could feel him breathing down my neck the whole way around, which was never a good sign psychologically, even though he clearly wasn't ther (only speaking with hindsight there) as he was only just getting back in to the sports complex when i crossed the line, but i could sense him catching me all the time, but he was barely in sight, or should i say i was barely in his sight. his mums dogs wanted to join in our session but unfortunately being furry with four legs usually means having no road sense and thinking that you can just cut people up without excusing yourself and stopping to piss in the middle of the road. they would have good speed though if nothing else. for both of us it was a case that this session came just too soon after thursday nights exertions. the fitness is there for both of us but we both had too much fatigue in our legs to get the extra bit of zip. with good quality rest it will be there by next week though providing we don't go mad on tuesday. its just a case of making sure our legs are a) fresh and b) ticking over eg we don't overdo the inactivity.

fine tuning preparations

its all about next weekend now. the midland road relay championships are almost upon us and the next few days are all about fine tuning our preparations so that we are ready to run the leg of our lives next weekend and the two weeks later in the national. thursdays session on the hills at sneyd park was a short but tough one with 6 uphill repetitions of about 1.1 kilometers. there was only a small crowd of 4 of us out, that was me craig peters, jerry hogan and the seemingly indefatigueable dave austin. craig was about 20-25 secs out in front per rep with me leading the chasing group, or just me on my own for the final two reps after the othertwo dropped out due to fatigue from races at the weekend. i managed times of 3:34 3;33, 3:26, 3:30 3:28 and 3:28 for the 1st two i rather felt like i was coasting a little bit too much but it was a deliberate tactic to ease my self in to the session rather than go hell for leather in the first couple of reps and as it turned out it was probably the right thing and i really started to absolutely crucify my self on the 3rd rep with a significant change of pace and by the end of the session especially after having to run the last two reps on my own i was literally out on my feet and could't have run another step if i wanted to. unusually for a saturday there is a session this afternoon, which i will be attending, but it will be just me and craig this time a 4k tempo run around the streets of coombe dingle. the two objective of the session will be to be the 1st home and to beat my time from the previous time we did it 13:25, i will though be given a two minute head start on one of the rising stars of british athletics. with a final session on tuesday evening it will then be a case of resting and keeping the old legs ticking over for saturday to make sure that a our a teams wins and b our b team is the 1st b team and we both make the top 20 and qualify for the national 12 stage on april 14th. may the force be with us!

old fat face

after feeling rather heavy when i ran today i was rather horrified when i stepped on the scales to find out why this may be, that i had put on 3 pounds in weight. needless to say that i will be doing my absolute best to make sure that comes of asap. last niights session at the zoo was longer and consequently, harder than the usual ones at the zoo running a total of about 9.5k in repetitions, some thing that made my legs certainly felt the worse for wear today...mike in has infinite wisdom had dreamed up a longer circuit for us to run for the first few reps, needless to say that we were all happy to carry out his instructions to the letter. for the two really long reps about a mile and a quater, i managed to squeeze them both under 7 minutes, followed by some another shorter rep (but longer then our usual circuit) i managed to cut them down to 3:45 each, followed again by 2 laps each of our usual 2 circuits coming in at 254 and 253 for the longer one and 217 and 215 for the shorter one. i have run faster on bith of those but consideering the extra vollume of wwork that we carried out before moving on to our usual cicuits, i considered my self entitiled to be rather pleased with my nights work. not very often i say that, but i think you have to give yourself a pat on the back occasionally.

on a different note it was good to see rob whalley finally back training with us last night after around 6 weeks off with a severe cold. he hasn't had the best start to 2007 and really he was in the last chance saloon this year for his final realistic attempt at a place in the world cross country team a team he has graced with distinction many times over the years, but unfortunately, over the past few years, he has just fallen short at the final hurdle when it has come to the trials and national championships, and he will probably never regain the form that took him to a silver medal at the national 2 years ago or 3 aaa short course cross country titles. i'll stop talking about that now, i'm dreaming of being that good. if only...

an early start

dragged my self out of bed for my long run at 7:30 this morning. well it wassn't a case of dragging my self out of bed really, i felt fresh and well rested and that i had slept well. thats a sure sign that i am well enough rested after the couple of days off i had earlier in the week and i a ready to have a crack at my 10k pb again, in a couple of weeks time. another race that is now on the list of possibilities, if i am given the time off work is the gloucester easter 10k on the saturday 7th april. i ran on a large part of the course yesterday and it looks fast and flat, which is exactly what i am looking for. sub 37 minutes is the goal forthe rest of the season and given the right weather conditions on the day and providing i stay injury free between now and the end of the season, i see no reason why i can't achiev that really quite comfortably.

this mornings run was a 14 mile route which took me from home along the portishead to cleavedon coast road, which was exceptionally windy along the whole route, did a lap of clevedon town centre and i ran back along the clevedon road, the other road betwen potishead and clevedon, the route included 2 clims of about 100 meters in altitude one about 600 meters in lenghth and the other about a mile and a half so all in all a rather tough route, but that is necessary part of winter training as it is all about toughening you up ready for the summer track season. my legs were certainly tired towards the end!

fixture for the track season have just been published and there are lots of clashes between bmc meetings and and league meetin gs that could have been avoided. thats one thing that really infuriates me about athletics in this country, that none ofthe governing bodies never seem to communicate in the name of putting that athletes first and are always putting us in a position where we are having to make decisions. i've no doubt i'll get conned in to doing one of the league meetings where i'll end up running on my own again, very difficult to run hard doing that on the track, with no competitors to push me within 10 seconds of me in either direction. hope i don't lap some one on my warm down lap like i did 2 years ago though!

post race report

well i managed to drag my self up to gloucester for the 4 mile road race event today. it was a low key event with only 60 runners taking part, and i placed a rather disappointing 21st. the time of 23:22 although it equalled my clevedon time i still feel as though there is far too much room for improvement for me to be complacent and give my self a pat on the back, because i don't think i deserve it. the winning time was just under 20 minutes which gives a clear indication that there is a long hard and arduous road ahead, before i am even close to where i want to be in the long term. that may sound like i am being a bit unrealistic, but a) everybody has to have dreams b) it pays to aim high if you are also dedicated and believe in your own abilities and also c) i don't care if its unrealistic.

the day didn't start too well when i got the wrong name for the pub/restaurant that was hosting the event, i thought it was the red lion instead of the white horse. i take full responsibility for it and it resulted in me having to jog 2 miles back through sandhurst village when i realised my error. i take full responsility for it though and will learn from it for next time.

the plan for the race rather than holding back early on was to go out hard right from the startwhich was exaactly what i did. for the first time in my life, i beat kate goodheadwho won the ladies race, infact i was 35 seconds clear of her. not sure how much i should read in to that though, i did 23:22, which equalled my clevedon time on a course which is (allegedly) about 100 meters short of being the full 4 miles. it was though dead flat unlike clevedon which has a big hill which is about a mile up and down right smack bang in the middle of the course. i didn't get the sub 23 minute clocking that i was hoping for, but i am sure that with a good summer, that will come next year. i hesitate to say easily, because there is nothing easy about the sport of distance running with the demands that it plces on the body. the day culminated with mixing with the gloucester rugby fans after their teams victory over the harlequins, theorising over who was going to win the premiership and the future of rugby in england. with the rise of clubs like plymouth albion and exeter and penzance it lies firmly in the west country, with the established trio, of bristol bath and gloucester plus leicester and northampton. the northern and london clubs will struggle to survive against clubs with such massive fan bases as they have developed as far as they can go.

training wise it will be a long run tomorrow of 12-14 miles , probably the last of the winter before we have a break then slip bakc in to the summer training mode. forecasting snow for tuesday so the club session could be interesting on tuesday night!

a busy few days

well on the training front it has been any way. only the one session, which i did by my self on wednesday. i deliberately chose a wednesday to do it just to get me out of the tuseday-thursday routine, don't think there was any physical benefit in doing that, but i just fancied doing it. apart from that it has been a diet of steady runss varying from 5 to 8 miles in length. part of the reason why i did the session on the wednesday as opposed to the thursday wasto qalllow mee more recovery time for the racce at gloucester tomorrow. 4 miles is an unusual distance although i have raaced over that distance before at clevedon 3 times in the traditional boxinfg day race, where katee reed last year brok paula radcliffe's british record for the distance, in spite of the rather steep hill in the midle section of the course. facts like that make you wonder as to the accuracy of the course, whether or not it is a hundred yards or so short. there was the option of doing the cardiff military st davids day 5k on sunday in the welsh capital but i was put off by the numbers of people running around what is a park course on narrow paths. i didn't fancy tthe idea of having to fight my way past people to get a fast time by running on the grass. i am looking for a race next weekend as well as i also have next saurday off.

looking at options for the upcoming track season, it looks as though 1500's are going to be the main thing again withh 800's and 400's coming later on in the season as i get faster plus a few 3000's and maybe a 5000 if my legs feel strong enough, but hopefully if they do i will bee in a proper race rather then being left on my own as i was in the last 2 times i have done 5000's

reassessing priorities

having had a discussion with my coach last night, it was decided that all the group would be given the option of having the whole week off training, although there would be sessions going on, i decided this 1. i would miss tomorrow nights session. 2 i would also ggive the weston prom run on thursday a miss as well. instead i would do the thursday night session and the race on thursday. 3 the priority for he rest of the season would be to have another asssault on my 10k pb. the next 10k race that i would be available for are on the 9th of april. with that in mind it probably wouldn't do any harm to have a couple of days of virtually complete rest with only very light jogging. this would ensure that i am fresh enough for the races. had i carried on training at the same intensity for the next 4 weeks, by the time race day came around, my body would be completely exhausted and really that would be shooting my self in the foot.

as i said only light jogging tonight. thursdays race is now definitely off and saturday is only probable depending on how things go on thursday evening. the fact that i am still running pb's at this sstagee of the seasson demonstrates that there is a lot more to come from me in my athletic career.

hunger pains

i've got hunger pains and i think its from last sundays race! i have learnt over the years that hunger is a part of the recovery process and if you didn't have that appetite then you wouldn't recover properly, because it is food that provides all the carbohydrates, proteins and minerals that are essential for energy, muscle rebuilding and maintaining your immune system. managed 8 miles this morning, should have been twelve but my legs were feeling a bit tired from the hilly 8 mile run i did last night so i made the decision to curtail it at 8 in view of the fact that i haven't done a twelve mile run for a while and so i didn't want to push my self too far as i still have a bit of tendonitis lingering in my knee. it has virtually all gone now thanks to the ice pack treatment that i have been giving it. now it only rears its ugly head when i have been standing still on it for a couple of hours, and even then it is some thing that is only noticable and not painful by any means. i don't think that the problem was caused by running, rather by the fact that the bikes at work are way too small for a giant like me and were causing me to rid in a style that was cramped combined with the fact that you are obviously putting pressure on your joints when riding.

squash this afternoon for me rather then running and quite probbably another thrashing it usually is, followed by a swim or rather perving at young girls in bikinis, no more running until tomorrow now.

the stresses of modern life

orange mobile phone company are the biggest bunch of wankers in history. that is official. no contest. why? i set up a plan to repay money i owed them. ihave paid the first two installments, as agreed but they haven't acknowledged receipt of either payment and are persisting in demanding money off me, in spite of the fact that i have produced, bank statements, photocopies of cheques as proof that i did pay them, wihtin the agreed time scale, they are denying recieving any money off me at all. WANKERS!

anyway enough of that, nothing much to report on the running front at the moment, there have been no interval sessions since tuesday, owing to the fact that many people were resting ahead of the national cross country championships in sunderland today, with wells city harriers frnk tickner going for a unique cross country grand slam, being the first person ever to win the euopean champs trials, the world champs trials the inter counties championships and 'the national' all in the same season. 'the national' may not have the same prestige it once had, but when you look down the years at some of the athletes who have won it and you see names like steve ovett, paula radcliffe, sydney wooderson, fred norris, nick rose, walter george, rob denmark, steve jones it is like a who's who of british athletics. who knows, maybe pete skinner will one day be mentioned in the same breath as those legends? i doubt it somehow but as the saying goes aim for the moon and even if you miss you'll still be among the stars. i've said many times before that cross country isn't my thing, i am a track and road runner, whilst i would never refer to my self as exceptionally fast or strong, probably a good mix of both would be a better description, i don't have the style for cross country with those hills etc as it disrupts my stride pattern too much.

two races next week, the weston prom run on thursday, followed by the gloucester 4 miler on saturday aiming for two pbs. my legs have recovered from last sunday, nwo i'm ready to rock and roll again!

another easy run

yes another easy run tonight. well plus a game of squash as well, which i was roundly thrashed at as per usual. probably a combination of last nights mile reps and the race on sunday mean that my legs just weren't responding to any thing particularly well. those phiten wrist bands do help with recovery but after a hard 10k it can be a long process, a few days at least. i have now declared my availability for the midland road relays, but rather unfortunately it cleashes with the bath v bristol european challenge cup quater final so a choice had to be made and inevitably running took precedence. the 12 stage relay championships have become some thing of a holy grail for the club over the past few years. we are strong accross the board this year but i still can't see us beating newham and essex beagles or anyone for that matter. top 3 would be a fantastic result not that it would matter too much to me as i wont be in the 1st team firstly because my participation is in grave doubt due to work secondly because i am just not good enough to be mentioned in the same breath as the top guys.

it was an easy one tonight as i have already mentioned as my legs are tired but they should be ok by the time of my next race on thursday week, the next installment in the weston prom run series, where i will be aiming to beat my current 5 mile pb of 29:32. away from the subject of running theres a big game for the city tonight away at chesterfield, made doubly biig by the fact that forest, rather surprisingly, lost last night and it gives us the chance to go 2nd with a game in hand. bring em on!

feeling fresher

the old legs were much better tonight but still not 100% fresh. mind you though the times for the mile repeptitions i was doing were only a few seconds down on the previous time we trained at aztec west. all were under 5:40, my times were 5:37, 5:31, 5:34 and 5:36. the last time i did a 10k road race (brighton), by strange quirk of fate we did aztec on the tuesday afterards as well that week and all my times were over 5:40. once the leading guys had disappeared in to the distance i found my self in the usual position of being 2nd or 3rd in the chasing group, jus behind the leaders. we had a new group member tonight, 14 year old nathan young of mendip ac, already a national champion for his age group on the track and cross country, needless to say he left most people for dead apart from the select few at the front.

after all the wind ups that have been aimed in my direction by dave austin about his 10k pb being 1 second faster than mine i was finally able to secure bragging rights. neeless to say he dismissed my wind up by pointing out that with my speed that i should be running faster over 10k any way. he is of course right though and i will be aiming to get even faster over the summer, starting with sub 4:30 for 1500 and sub 2:10 for 800 meters. it would be nice to do a 3000 or a 5000 on the track as well just to give me a chance of beating those pbs. when i use the word nice, in connection with the 5000 and 3000, it should really be in inverted commas as its isn't that at all really, it is infact rather unpleasant running around the track, with no shelter from the sun, and sweat dripping in to your eyes, then getting lapped by some of the elite guys at the front of the race. but it gets results and thats what this game is all about.

my achy legs

legs were tired today as you would expect after running a hard 10k the previous day, but in terms of sheer exhaustion it is nothing compared to what i experienced after the previous 10k race i did down at brighton. i have discovered these new titanium wrist bands that work miracles for your recovery rate. they don't make you any faster but any thing that gives you an advantage over the competition has to be worth trying. it took me a full month to get the fatigue from brighton out of my legs properly adn i really can't see it taking that long for me to recover from this, infact i really feel as though there is more left in the tank as the course was slow, the weather shite and i didn't feel bolloxed when i crossed the line in fact i felt as though i couuld manage another couple of k's at the same pace. i will certainly be looking for another course with pb potential before thee end of the winter season as i think sub 37 minutes is now very achievable.

mile reps at aztec west tomorrow, the only thing i like about this session is that it is flat. apart from that the long straights make it one of the hardest we do psychologically and the repetiitons are long, but the benfits of them will be felt when we all (hopefully) start runnning fast times on the track in the summer. but 1st of all we have the relay championships coming up and i for one can't wait for it as it is one of the biggest events in the athletics calender and it gives the paupers of the athletics world the chance to compete against some of the real stars of the athletics world like michael east, mo farah and dan robinson and get our asses roundly and soundly kicked by people who are simply in a different league.

what went wrong and what went right

well where do i start?

well lets get the neagtive stuff out of the way first.

1-out of bed at half past six. yes even for a postman on his day off, that can be a challenge

2-the wind was very strong.

3-the weather was shite

4-the weather was utterly shite

5-i ran thhrough a puddle that was 4 inches deep, rather stupidly, without thinking about the fact that i had no spare socks

6-i took no less then SIX wrong turns. blame that on the marshalling. i had to rely on other runners around me who, rather fortunately, had a vague idea where they were going, unlike me!

7- i ccouldn't find out my position after the race, which means that i willl have to wait until its published on the team bath or the city of bath ac website.

now what went right...

my brighton pb is now consigned to the history books. i sliced 17 secondss off it. given the weather conditions and the fact that the inter season is now almost at a close, i feel as thoughh i have every right too be pleased with that. that now puts me ahead of dave austin in the 10k rankings in our group. he was 1 second ahead of me before today, as he has reminded me several times over the past couple of months so it was nice to seccure the bragging rights once again. i felt reasonably fresh, or as fressh as coould be expected after running a hard race afterwards, so i really feel as though there is more to come there before the end of the season. that 10k down at lewes is starting to look quite tempting...

as for the european indoors, great britain finish top of the medals table and who would of thought that after the dismal euro outdoors that we had last summer? jason gardner has proved once again that he is the man when it comes to indoor sprinting. craig pickering got a well deserved silver medal. he may of been the favourite going in to the championships, but i think everyone, him included was just awestruck by the quality of the performance by 'the bath bullet'. the bronze medal won by the high jumper martyn bernard was completely out of the blueand has provided light at the end of the tunnel that we may have a future star who could takke after dalton grant and steve smith.

the only badd note of the championships was the poor form of jo pavey who was clearly suffering the effects of a viral infection that she has apparently been carrying for a few weeks since her british 2 mile record at the same venue. although she tried to run the legs off everybody from the start as she usually does, she looked laboured quite early on and it was clear that it wasn't going to be her day-again. it seems as though that phrase about being the eternal bridesmaid was invented for her as she finished 5th against a field that she was the fastest of by nearly ten seconds.

british athletes on the up-including me

a good session at the zoo on thursday night. it was the same session that we usually do alternating between long and short circuits, 4 of each. i managed 2:53, 2:49, 2:55 and 2:57 on the longer reps with 2:12, 2:17 2:08 and2:15 on the shorter reps. i left everybody for dead on the 2:08 of the shorter reps leading one of the older guys to comment that he thought that i had the speed of a 400 meter runner. not sure about that one my self, but i certainly feel that i have questions to answer over the shorter distances, i feel that i have more potential than i have demonstrated thus far in my career. eventually, i would likee to do sub 55 seconds although it probably does seem a long way off looking at the pb's on my profile, but you have to remember that was done 1 hour after running a 1500 meter race at a league meeting.

talking of 400 meters, the commentators were fast running out of superlatives to describe the performance of young nicola sanders at the european championships. i wont use any myself but i will say that she ran the 5th fastest ever 400 meters by a female, indoors or out, on an indoor track, missing the european record by afraction of a second, with nobody on the track near her at the finish. 50.05 seconds was the time. mo farah ran well in todays 3000 final but he looked as though the fall he took in yesterays heats took some thing out of him when you consider the ground that he had to make up, especially when you lose your bearings when you get up and run the wrong way! surely jo pavey must one day win a major international title, but i fear that she is somewhat lacking in form from what i saw of her when she set the british 2 mile record a few weeks ago, when her legs were so tired she was wandering out in to lanes 2 and 3 in th straights. as for lisa dobriskey the other brit in the final i do wonder about her attitude when she came out straight after the birmingham race saying that when she was on jo's shoulder, she held back because she was aware that jo was desperate to break the world record. nice of her to be so considerate, but it doesn't get you very far in the harsh world of professional sport.

back to what i'm doing it'll be the team bath 10k tomorrow and i'll certainly be having a crack at my pb. if my previous 5 mile races are anything to go by it should be under serious threat. at the very worst it will be a good hard run out before the relays begin in ernest in 4 weeks time. i have never come away from a 10k race feeling that i have paced it perfectly, i have always falagged towards the end of the race, so hopefully i can get under 37 minutes. i read the other day in runners world about some guy who had done 100 10k races under 40 minutes. now thatt would be some thing to aim for! any way i'm just off for a run now, but i'll be eating plenty of pasta and rice tonight to give me plenty of energy to burn

did an 8 mile steady run last night, nothing special, but i just wanted to get the disappointment of tuesday night out of my system. i probably went a bit too hard for the first 5 miles or so but i don't think it did me any harm. going to the zoo for an interval session tonight, i just hope that i am not slipping backk in to my old habits fof training well and racing badly, just like i was ;ast year.

further to what i said yesterday, looking further in to the race fixtures, i also noticed that there is a 10k down at lewes on easter monday. if i could get accomodation organised, then that one is also a possibility. i'll have rto do some sort of research on the course as it is quite hilly around the course and the last thing that i would want is to turn up on race day only to find out that there is a long steep hill and therefore no pb potential