Sunday cycle

Decided to go out on my road bike rather than mountain bike.

Left the house at about 5:45am. It was a beautiful morning.

My route went from Bristol, down the A38 to Churchill, through to Winscombe, over to Axbridge and then Cheddar. Up through Cheddar Gorge (photo) and then over to Priddy, West Harptree, Chew Valley lake, over Dundry hill and finally back into Bristol.

3 hours, 50 miles = tired back, tired legs, sore backside.

Back to running tomorrow night - over to the BAD Kids track night at Filton Sports Academy and then a longer route back.

During the ride today, I had the following track running through my mind - No batteries required!

A matter of pace...

Just wanted to get over what a finely balanced race the ONER will be.

To complete the course within the 24 hour cut-off requires an average speed of 3.3 mph.

The ONER in 2007 had 20 starters and only 5 finishers. The second placed finisher completed the course with an average speed of 3.93mph.

So, 0.6 mph average is the difference between just squeezing past the cut-off and achieving second place.

GULP!

GWR Towpath 10k - Race 1

These races are great - Turn up with your number pinned-on, race, finish, go home (happy).

The course is a measured 10km along the towpath under the Clifton Suspension bridge. The terrain only has a few undulations, nothing you could call a hill. It's an out and back course.

Last night's conditions were very good. It was cool with a bit of a breeze, and a few muddy puddles to keep the legs cool.

I went out with the goal of beating my one and only previous attempt at the race in June last year - 41mins01secs.

The race began well, and the first 5km passed fairly easily. However, after the turnaround (19mins28secs) I began to slow. There just wasn't much in my legs/lungs. The difference in pace was very noticeable. But I hung-in and just managed to squeeze under 40mins (39mins58secs), which is a personal best and brought me in 33rd out of 229 finishers.

Today I've recovered well, and could probably do a long run tomorrow, but just to play it safe I'll go out on my mountain bike - Hopefully a hard 4 hour session. I'm making some good progress with my training and I want to make sure I keep progressing, and don't get injured.

Night-running deserves a quiet night

Went out on Saturday night (25 Apr) for a night run. The purpose of the run was to try out my head-torch and to get a feel for running at night.

The run took place between about 8pm and around 11:30pm, and covered about 19 miles.

The run was just mad - running through woods and along the towpath. A bit spooky, but exciting and fun too.

I was pretty shot on Sunday, but am OK'ish now.

My next goals are:

• Add another leg weights session per week to help balance my leg strength
• Reduce my Sunday long runs to 20 miles and increase my Monday long runs to reach 20 miles, so that I'm doing 20 miles + 20 miles back-to-back
• Do the first half of the ONER course before the end of May, not worrying about how long it takes, just getting used to the course

Night-running, remembering that night
August's coming soon I'm pining for the moon
And what if there were two
Side by side in orbit
Around the fairest sun?
That bright, tight forever drum
Could not describe night-running

(Modified Nightswimming lyrics, R.E.M.)

Very pleased...

...today I clocked up a 24 miles training session in 5 hours.

I set my alarm for 4:45am, and was out of the door by 5am.

The route began by running down through the centre of Bristol and around the Harbourside. Then out along the towpath beneath the Clifton Suspension bridge. Up through Leigh Woods, across to Abbots Pool, through 100-Acre wood and then around Ashton Court. From Ashton Court, I went around Leigh Woods some more and then back down to the towpath. Followed this along to Pill and then over the M5 across the Avonmouth bridge. I managed to find about 4-5 miles of off-road path on my way back in to Bristol before I was forced to run along the Portway (A4). Finally up through Clifton and back home.

My mapped route looked something like:


And here are a couple of photos I took along route as I was overjoyed to be running amongst Bluebells and Hawthorn blossom.




The only downside of the whole run, was being attacked by a Poodle in a jumper (no I wasn't hallucinating!) as I climbed up a steep hill to get to Clifton. It really was the most unattractive dog as well as being badly behaved.

Hills, hills, hills...

The last week has been a bit of a recovery week. I skipped the long run over the Easter weekend, but did get out for two runs, an 8-miler with a friend Jon, who we stayed with in St Ives, and another (5 miles) on my own.

I have recently taken the step of trading-in pure miles for shorter more intense hill training sessions.

My weekly schedule is now usually:

Sunday - Long run (unless it's a recovery week)
Monday - Medium / long run to back-up the Sunday run
Tuesday - Rest day
Wednesday - Hills
Thursday - Weight training
Friday - Hills
Saturday - Rest day

Trading-in the pure miles seems to be suiting me better. I feel less like I'm on the verge of illness or injury, and I am recovering better from my training sessions and feel like I'm getting stronger.

Yesterday was a typical hills session taking-in a variety of local hills. I wore my Heart Rate Monitor out of interest. The results were as follows:


I gave it some stick up Marlborough Hill. A hill steep enough to get my HR up towards its limit. My heart maxed-out at 184bpm which was lower than I was expecting.

My max-HR used to be about 192bpm. Maybe my max-HR has lowered due to age.

Hoping for another good long run this Sunday.

A historic training session...

I had an opportunity today to train both when and where I liked. Suzi had taken the children to Dorset to visit her Mother. I would have gone too, but I've been getting a bit run down by Felix's terrible sleep, so I stayed at home to do some DIY jobs, sleep and go for a good long run.

I decided to use this opportunity to train away from my normal trails around Bristol. And much as I don't normally reminisce, today's training session was a trip down memory lane for me.

In the morning, I got a bus from Bristol to Churchill in Somerset. Even the bus ride reminded me of a bus journey back from Bristol to Hill Farm, where I used to live, with a girl friend, after a good day's ice skating.

From Churchill, I ran (well actually mostly walked) up to Rowberrow Warren, and then on up to the top of Beacon Batch, Somerset's highest point - 1066ft above sea level. Here, I had previously been on School walks and youth club camps, and in my teens I could even be found tearing around this area on a motorbike.




From Beacon Batch I headed over to Cheddar - Somewhere I sailed (a bit) previously on the resovoir. I even had a few piano lessons in Cheddar when I was about 7 or 8 years old.

From Cheddar I run-walked over to Shute Shelve hill, and then up through Kings Wood, past Hill Farm, where I used to live, and along to Crooks Peak.

I lived at Hill Farm from about 1972 until around 1982. During most of my time there, I was always out on the hill - playing in the woods, riding bikes, hiding in the bracken, riding horses with my Mother - I have many fond memories of that time.

From Crooks Peak, I descended down to Barton, then on to Loxton and Christon, and over a hill and along a Roman road to Uphill.

I finished my run by running along the beach at Weston-Super-Mare.


All in all, I run-walked for 4hrs 30mins, which was 30mins longer than last week, although the same mileage - 22 miles. The extra 30 mins was accounted for by the very hilly route. At least as hilly as I expect the ONER course to be.

A good day out.