Sunday 25 April 2010

Training Week 21 Recap

Hi all,

Here is the recap for week 21. I'm still feeling the effects of this week's training with a few sore spots in the legs. I think it's time I booked a sports massage. Trust me, they are good!

Tuesday
Type: Threshold
Time and Distance: 61 mins, 12.6 km.
Detail: 2.1 km warm up. 3 x 2800m (11:45, 11:55, 11:52) with 3 mins recovery. 2.1 km cool down with some strides near the end. Averaging around 4:10 - 4:15 min/km, but definitely getting slower as the repeats went on.

Thursday
Type: Continuous Hills
Time and Distance: 52 mins, 11.8 km.
Detail: 1.1 km warm up. 2 sets of 6 hill reps (400m) with 3 mins recovery. Each set was approximately 20 mins. 1.1 km cool down.

Saturday
Type: Easy
Time and Distance: 98 mins 9 secs, 17.6 km.
Detail: Kept it easy and conversational. Tended to go fast in places, but overall effort was easy.

Total Weekly Distance: 42 km.

Comments: 42 km this week may look like a low volume week, but it's actually been a very tough week in terms of quality. I was quite surprised at how the continuous hill session went. I'm not too sure whether the ascent was 400m (Google Maps told me this!), but 6 reps of 800m would equate to 4800m in approximately 20 minutes. I've never run a 5 km race in under 20 minutes, so to know that I can achieve this would be a great psychological boost.

Improvements: More of the same for next week. Just focus on the quality of my threshold runs and continuous hills, and I think I can't do much wrong at this stage. Continuous hills has added a new dimension to my training, so to do these is only going to make me a stronger runner.

After watching George Anderson's video on Running Technique, I've started to concentrate a lot more on my running form - in particular how to be more efficient when running. When going out for a training run, it's so easy to forget about your running technique, especially when you haven't had any exposure on what constitutes good running technique. If you watch the elites, they make running look so easy. With the right technique and the resulting economy of movement, a runner can run faster, longer and expend less energy when doing so. Check out his video, and make it a point to really concentrate on every footstep in every run.

I have my second marathon for the year lined up in Copenhagen next month. Like Rotterdam, I'm going to take it easy, and perhaps incorporate a fast finish to the race. The time isn't important, but maybe I can go better than the 3:59:22 I ran at Rotterdam with comparatively little effort.

Finally the London Marathon was on today, and the men's elite field boasted a very powerful lineup this year, including the defending champion and course record holder, current world champion, and the second fastest marathoner of all time. However, in the marathon, lofty reputations do not count and none of them managed to win this year, let alone finish the race. It was also the case for the women's race as well, with little-known, relatively inexperienced runners trumping their more experienced opponents. It's amazing to see how, on the day, a great runner with a wealth of titles and records could perform way below standard. From what I've seen I think there are two things that will carry runners through to victory. A lot of preparation, and a little race-day magic (or maybe a lot)!

Cheers!

Aaron

Sunday 18 April 2010

Training Week 20 Recap

Hey guys,

This week's training recap is a little short, having only returned back from Holland mid week, so I've only gotten 2 training runs in. Here is the lowdown.

Saturday
Type: Easy
Time and Distance: 79 mins, 12.5 km.
Detail: Very easy and conversational. Probably the slowest I've run all year.

Sunday
Type: Steady
Time and Distance: 90 mins, 17.8 km.
Detail: Not my best run, started too fast, had a weak middle, and then a fast finish.

Total Weekly Distance: 30.3 km.

Comments: Just a low volume week to get the rust off.

Improvements: Next week I'm planning a few tough sessions, so hopefully I'll get those benefits I'm hoping for. Hello, threshold runs and continuous hills.

To close, I've managed to get my personal pictures from the Rotterdam Marathon, which I'll include here. Some of them aren't of me, but they're so good I had to put them in.
These two pictures are my favourites. Presumably father and son, two kids give a beer to a runner just a couple of hundred metres from the finish. Just metres back, I'm behind the runner in the green t-shirt.
Good kid. I'll drink this beer quickly and then cross the finish!
A few metres back, I'm making my move towards the finish.
Thinking of a beer right now!
Nope, a beer is a diuretic. Just ask that old man on the right.
Overtaking the guy in green and the guy with the beer, and on towards the finish! No beer for me, but I'm cool with that!

Nite!

Aaron

Friday 16 April 2010

Rotterdam Marathon 2010 - Race Report

Hi all,

Here's my race report on the Rotterdam Marathon, as it happened. In summary I kept it pretty easy, and wanted to see if I could go under 4 hours. I'm happy to say I managed to do this, and even managed to speed up as the race went on. Being the 30th Rotterdam Marathon, it was a jubilee event, so the organisers went all out this year to make it a success.

On the day before the marathon, I picked up my race number from the marathon expo. Unfortunately I didn't win the free trip to "some place warm", but the pasta party that night allowed me unlimited pasta at the top of the Euromast, the tallest building in Rotterdam. Looking at the great views of the city, I managed to help myself to three generous helpings of pasta and was thoroughly loaded!

The next day was race day. It was unusual in that it started at 11am. This meant a normal wake up time, but by then the sun would be high in the sky. Thankfully, the clouds were out and it ended up being a very very cool day for the most part. I felt that a world record might be broken in these conditions.

After a good breakfast, I made my way to the starting areas. At the last minute, I decided to take my camera and my phone with me. I wanted to take some pictures of the race in progress, which I'll include in this post.

11am ticked over, and the race formally started with a cannon blast, which I managed to hear amid the cacophony of noise on the Coolsingel. Soon, I started to run my own race. A lot of people were passing me from behind but I tried to ignore them, put my head down, and ran at the pace I wanted to sustain for the entire time. After 1 km, the watch was 6:15, after 2 km it was 12:15. Perfect - I'll try and maintain 6 mins/km throughout and see what happens.

Along the way I took quite a few pictures. It was pretty much an easy effort up to the half way mark. I got there in around 2:03. If I kept going at that pace, I would be clocking around 4:06. I wondered if I could break 4 hours by going just a little faster. Around 25 km, my legs were starting to fatigue a bit, but I still managed to hold on without slowing down. By 31 km, the time was approximately 3:00. At that point, I tweeted on the run whether I could do 11 more km in 60 minutes.

The sun was high in the sky by now, and I was getting tired by then. I wasn't feeling it in my lungs, but I was feeling it in my legs. Yet I still didn't slow down. Every km marker I passed, I kept looking at my watch, doing the maths in my head. I was still on target! But only just. As soon as I entered the Coolsingel, with around 300 metres to go, I decided to do a sprint finish and managed to cross the line in 3:59:22. A new season best for this year!

The baggage tents, where runners keep their bags, were also the changing areas for runners. The Dutch aren't afraid to strip naked and change their clothes, which is an eye-opener! Only in Holland! After I picked up my bag, knowing there weren't any massage services around, I headed to the hotel and crashed for the day. Probably not the smartest thing to do considering that my muscles were very tight after 4 hours of continuous running. The after-effects were still apparent after 3-4 days, but now my legs are fine!

To summarise, here are some of my personal highlights, and lowlights, of this year's Rotterdam Marathon.

Highlights
  • Unlimited pasta at the top of the Euromast.
  • Finishing on the Coolsingel among thousands of supporters.
  • Awesome crowd support along the way.
  • Many live music performances and bands along the way.
  • Free t-shirt with your race pack. That's always a nice thing to have.
  • Grabbing food from the locals. I was trying to grab pretzel sticks from a lady, dropped all of them once I grabbed them, and then another guy ran after me, kept pace with me and held out a bag of potato chips while I managed to grab a handful!

Lowlights
  • No massage facilities!!!
  • Relatively early cut-off target time of 5:30. For those not able to meet this finishing time, you're out of luck finishing the marathon officially.
  • Drinks stations quite sparse. Having drink stations every 5 km is a bit hard for us runners.
And now some photos.
A giant banner on display at the marathon expo containing supportive messages for this year's marathon runners.
Some nice person even left me a message. This person's always one step ahead of me ;-)
The Euromast, where I helped myself to unlimited pasta!
Jammed in the starting pen between the 3:30 - 4:00 marathoners.
Crossing the Erasmus Bridge, around 1 km into the marathon.
Somewhere around the 15 km mark. This was mostly residential/park area.
Crossing the Erasmus Bridge again heading back towards the city centre, around the 26 km mark.
Entering the Coolsingel, with only a few hundred metres to go. You can really feel the crowd support here.
Only a few hundred metres to go from here.
Getting closer!
And finally, it is finished! Sore legs, but not too exhausted from it all.

1 down, 4 to go. Copenhagen is next! After my run in Rotterdam, I'm confident that I can put in another solid, but unspectacular, time in Copenhagen next month. After all, it's just another training run, and an excuse to visit a city. Let's hope my trip doesn't get disrupted because of Iceland's volcanic ash!

Best,

Aaron

Thursday 15 April 2010

Training Week 19 Recap

Hey all,

I'm back from Holland with only 12 or so hours to spare before those volcanic ashes really ground air travel to a complete halt in and out of the UK. Really enjoyed my time in Rotterdam and Amsterdam. More on the Rotterdam Marathon later. Firstly, the training recap from last week.

Monday
Type: Easy
Time and Distance: 46 mins, 8.2 km.

Tuesday
Type: Threshold
Time and Distance: 54 mins, 11.4 km.
Detail: Warm up for 2 km. 3 x 2400m in 10 minutes with 5 mins recovery in between.

Thursday
Type: Continuous Hills
Time and Distance: 40 mins, 8 km.
Detail: 2 sets of 6 hill reps at threshold pace. Recovery of 3 minutes between sets.

Sunday
Type: Marathon
Time and Distance: 239 mins 22 seconds, 42.195 km.
Detail: Kept the pace and intensity easy the whole way. Legs started getting tired around the 25-30 km mark. Still managed to go faster as the race went on.
Splits: 5 km: 30:00. 10 km: 59:37. 15 km: 1:28:35. 20 km: 1:57:19. Half marathon: 2:03:44. 25 km: 2:25:54. 30 km: 2:54:14. 35 km: 3:21:23. 40 km: 3:48:17.
Time between splits: 5 km: 30:00. 10 km: 29:37. 15 km: 28:58. 20 km: 28:44. 25 km: 28:35. 30 km: 28:20. 35 km: 27:09. 40 km: 26:54.
Average pace between splits: 5 km: 6:00 min/km (10.0 km/h). 10 km: 5:58 min/km (10.05 km/h). 15 km: 5:47 min/km (10.35 km/h). 20 km: 5:44 min/km (10.44 km/h). 25 km: 5:43 min/km (10.5 km/h). 30 km: 5:40 min/km (10.58 km/h). 35 km: 5:26 min/km (11.05 km/h). 40 km: 5:23 min/km (11.15 km/h). Finish: 5:02 min/km (11.88 km/h).

Total Weekly Distance: 69.795 km.

Comments: This looks to be a very hard week, with the threshold running, continuous hills and a marathon all in one week. However it actually wasn't too bad. I managed to survive the two hard sessions during the week, then had a full two days rest to get ready for Rotterdam. It's very easy to go into a marathon thinking that it's a race and that you should do well, but I had to keep reminding myself that it's only a training run (only I've never done a long run in training that happened to be as long as a marathon itself). So I forced myself to reign in the pace, and I think I've coped with this week pretty well. No injuries yet! Of course my legs were aching after the race and for a few days after (well 4 hours of continuous foot pounding is going to do that to you), but now my legs are pretty much recovered and I should be able to start running again (slowly of course). I was keen to know my split times, and was surprised that I got faster as the race went on. This indicates that I was just cruising in this marathon, and also had extra energy left in the tank. The weather conditions were ideal so that also helped.

Improvements: After 4 days off running this week (week 20), I'm going to take it slowly this week, and concentrate on the easy stuff. Next week (week 21), I'll get back into the serious running.

Well, that was that, and soon I'll post a race report of Rotterdam as well. I thoroughly enjoyed Rotterdam (and the subsequent trip to Amsterdam). Rotterdam is a must-do event, so for anyone wanting to run a marathon in Europe, Rotterdam is a top choice! Starting with the blast of cannons, running across the Erasmus bridge, live bands playing a variety of music at every corner, and finishing on the Coolsingel (the main street in Rotterdam), it has all the hallmarks of a memorable event.

Finally, out of the top 5 fastest marathon runners of all time, 4 of them got their fastest times at Rotterdam. I would have loved to have gone all out last Sunday, but that would have gotten in the way of the overall goal. So, if you're looking to smash that PB, then run in Rotterdam.

Tot ziens!

Aaron

Thursday 8 April 2010

Aaron goes to Rotterdam

Hallo all,

Tomorrow, I'll be heading out to Rotterdam to run the Rotterdam Marathon! According to Runners World, Rotterdam is one of the top 10 marathons in the world, so to run this event is going to be an awesome moment.

On top of that, this year will be the 30th Rotterdam Marathon, which also coincides with my age(!), so it's basically a jubilee event. To celebrate, the organisers are giving away 2 free trips to "some place warm", provided that your race number, upon collecting it at the marathon expo, is inside a "golden envelope". Doesn't that remind you of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory?! Well, hopefully I can win that awesome prize!

Rotterdam is a very pancake-flat course, which is going to produce some spectacular times. Expect a world record (or close to world record time) this year! Unfortunately, I'm not in peak condition to run a fast marathon, so I'm going to take it easy, soak up the experience and jog my way through Rotterdam. Maybe I'll take my camera along with me and take a few snaps of Rotterdam, mile by mile! I was thinking of tweeting during the race, but I think that might be taking things a little bit too far!

The aim is to keep the intensity as easy as possible, probably around a 6 - 6.5/10 on the rate of perceived exertion scale. It will be interesting to see how well I reign in the pace as it's a natural tendency for me to speed up once I've hit my stride. I'm confident that I can finish the race comfortably, but I'm interested to see how my body holds up after the race, even at such a leisurely pace!

After Rotterdam, I'll be heading to Amsterdam for a few days to check out the city and hopefully stay out of trouble! In order to keep travel costs down, I've made a reservation in a budget hotel that has shared bathroom facilities on every floor. Not normally one to bring a towel on holiday, and being a hotel with shared bathroom facilities, I enquired whether the hotel provides towels to guests. The response I got was classic!

We change towels every day. However, if it is not a big problem for you, I suggest to bring yours, this is what I do all the time when I travel, it is more convenient for me. But we wash, dry and provide new towels every day.

HILARIOUS! I'm not really interested in whether or not you bring your towel on holiday. Isn't it more convenient to not bring a towel when you travel and just use what the hotel provides? I don't know whether she was serious, or just taking the piss. Is this a Dutch thing???

Finally, this week's training recap post will be postponed until I return. That will be followed by a race report, and hopefully some awesome pictures from the Rotterdam Marathon. As usual, I'll be tweeting from the event (but not when I run!), so follow me to get all the latest action from Rotterdam as it happens!

Tot ziens!

Aaron








Sunday 4 April 2010

Training Week 18 Recap

Hi guys,

Happy Easter everyone! I've had a pretty non-eventful Easter weekend so far. I'm actually looking forward to next weekend, where I'll be running the Rotterdam Marathon and going on a short trip through Rotterdam and Amsterdam. Suggestions on what to see and do there are always welcome!

Anyway, a week of rest is followed by a week of pretty hard running. I've cut short the volume in order to maximise the quality of each session. Let's see how I managed.

Tuesday
Type: Threshold
Time and Distance: 40 mins, 7.95 km.
Detail: 10 mins at 11 km/h pace. 1 x 10 min at 14.0 km/h pace, with 3 mins recovery at 8 km/h pace. 1 x 8 min at 14.0 km/h pace, with 3 mins recovery at 8 km/h pace. 1 x 6 mins at 14.0 km/h pace. Purpose was to find my threshold pace.

Thursday
Type: Continuous hills
Time and Distance: 39 mins, 7.7 km.
Detail: 2 sets of 6 hill reps at threshold pace. Recovery of 3 minutes between sets.

Saturday
Type: Long
Time and Distance: 96 mins, 16.6 km.
Detail: Kept the pace and intensity easy the whole way.

Total Weekly Distance: 32.25 km.

Comments: My first week back into running, and also my first week out of 10 weeks of pre-training before I commence the 16-week training programme designed by the FP Run Club. Anyway, how do you spell pain? C O N T I N U O U S - H I L L S. That is probably the hardest running session I've ever done! And I'm still feeling the effects after that run. Unlike the conventional hill session where you run hard up a hill and jog/walk/recover on the way down, continuous hills requires you to run hard up and down a hill, preferably at your threshold pace. The basic idea is that you gain strength, and build running economy and lactate threshold at the same time. This week has placed heavy emphasis on threshold running, which is the key to going faster for longer.

Improvements: It's going to be more of the same for next week. However I also have the Rotterdam Marathon next Sunday, and it's prudent that I don't do myself any damage with these threshold runs right before a 42 km long run. I may have to tone down the intensity of those threshold runs to ensure that I'm reasonably fresh for the marathon. Again, Rotterdam is just going to be another training run, where I need to make a huge conscious effort to go slow!

This week has really challenged my earlier beliefs of running and training. After my conversation with George Anderson from the FP Run Club he advised me not to be tied down to the pace I should be running at, and rather focus on the intensity of training. Pace is always going to vary. It will vary whether I have a good or bad day. It will vary whether I run uphill or downhill. And it will also vary on the weather conditions. Trying to run at a specific pace when it's hot, the course is hilly, or when I haven't fully recovered from a previous session, is likely to lead to over-training, burnout or injury.

Instead, George introduced me to the Rate of Perceived Exertion (RPE), which allows me to continually assess intensity and ensure a level of exertion that is comfortable or challenging. Training according to intensity is closely linked to training at your target heart rate zone based on your maximum heart rate, e.g. exercising so that your heart rate is between 85 - 90% of your maximum heart rate. At the moment I don't own a heart rate monitor, but I'm thinking of getting one. Does anyone have a favourite? The heart doesn't lie; the harder you work, the more your heart works, the more intense your training is.

The caveat that George mentioned is that maximum heart rate is unique for every person; using the basic formula of 220 minus your age is not going to apply to every runner. So, exercising at a specified zone based on a percentage of your maximum heart rate may not necessarily lead to you exercising at the right intensity based on the RPE scale.

Having said that, I'm still going to record the paces, times and distances that I run in training, but for each session I'm going to pay less attention to the pace I should be running at and focus on perceived intensity instead.

So for my effort at Rotterdam, I'm going to aim for a 6/10. Hopefully that will lead to a sub 4-hour time, but I won't be too disappointed if I go over that, even by a long way! Look out for some photos of Rotterdam (and Amsterdam) very soon!

Happy Easter everyone!

Aaron