Keeping the Streak alive

Today seems as good a day as any to start my account, this being my 2nd anniversary of my streak. Yes, I've run everyday for the past 730 days or 2 years. I'm currently building up again after sustaining a Tibia stress fracture 4 months ago caused by biomechanical reasons I think.

Had a nice easy 5 miles in 46mins 

With only 10 minutes before the start I was cutting it fine to be joining the queue for the toilets but as I’m familiar with the course was not too sure if  I could last for 3 miles without disgracing myself until we got into the country lanes with nice hedgerows.

Job done and now only 5 minutes to go I saw that nearly everyone had lined up at the start , keeping relaxed I just spotted J and got one kick of her football in and then joined the throng. Next to me stood a Vet of Snowdonia Marathon 2008 as he was wearing the T shirt. I’d joined the pack a little too far back something like two thirds back from the start line, it did mean I would be starting off slower but as I really wasn’t decided on pace or time it didn’t matter too much apart from weaving to keep from catching anyone’s heels.

The course leads us out of Freckleton village with one or small undulations and out towards Kirkham . By now I was nicely into a comfortable pace and by mile 4 had passed around 100 other runners including two known fetchies. Feeling really good and relaxed though it was very warm and I could see on the up undulations a lot were feeling it. As part of my comeback training I am incorporating many of my training runs with hilly routes including several parkruns.

Another reason of how I was coping well with the heat was the fact that I had two midweek runs of 11 and 12 miles when it was very warm early evening . At  the water stations I didn’t stop, grabbed a cup but only had a mouthful if that. I had of course drank around 400ml of Lucozade with Caffeine a half hour before the start. On my Training runs I hadn’t felt any need for hydration so didn’t carry any drink with me.

There was a nice breeze out in the more exposed sections and through the delightful Wrea Green there was plenty more support. By mile 7 I  was still playing  passing game and as one group was passed I looked further ahead for more victims. It did mean for the majority of the race that I was isolated and passing some Marshalls I commented “Where is everybody ?”

At that point some 200m ahead were my next group to catch and behind me some 200m were those that I’d passed some minutes earlier. It was a good distraction for me and a great way to race even if I wasn’t near my half mara pace I was thoroughly enjoying being a part of this race.

Mile 8 –10 was a dig in time for me and I was having a low point, but once again I had a laugh with marshals “don’t you tell me it’s not far to go!” of course the reply was …….

So out onto the home straight, which is in fact around one and a half miles of dual carriageway. Its flat and as so much of my training runs are along the East Lancs it didn’t come as too much of a problem mentally. Though I can see how many were now really struggling and 4 or 5 at mile 12 water station actually stopped running and walked a bit .

I like some of the final parts of this race, and this year was probably a better one for outside the pubs and houses we got some great support and some  rather lewd suggestions but that may have been directed at the F50 I passed.

One more group to go and a younger runner who I thought I wouldn’t again brushed passed me, so as I had a plan to attack the final mile anyway what was I supposed to do!

I held off until a quarter of a mile to go and chucked all I had left in me onto the fire, tired legs or not I was speeding up nicely young man was passed and one or two others .

Last turn and up hill slightly I carried on upping the pace until I hit the last 50 m on the grassy finish straight and dropped a gear and passed three more for good measure.

An early morning ( 05:30) medium long run to start the day and before the temperature climbed, the I was wearing a rain jacket initially this proved to heat me up so much after 6 miles as to cause some rather high hr readings (195 @ 9:30mm ?!!) where I was earlier on 132bpm for 9:30.

So third week of mara training is going  well 13miles in 2:05 felt easy enough and fast enough after the 17 on Sunday.

Another early start ( 04:35) for a 15 miler along wooded trails, canal paths and a few road miles to finish. 

The streak goes on and if only I was as good at blogging with regularity! I'm heavily into marathon training and just completed a 100+ mpw and I'm on 887 days of continuous running.

With three weeks to go for a very hilly Marathon I'm so tempted to do a tune up race, but finances won't allow it so I'll just have to sit on my hands.

Taper begins now with a reduction in volume but still working hard on the sessions in the Pete Pfitzinger/ Scott Douglas program.

Following my Tibia Stress Fracture earlier in the year I feel now that I almost back to my previous level of fitness maybe 95% now . But I've got my eye on more ahead , more weight loss, more mileage and more rest! I still don't feel I've found my upper limit of weekly mileage, yes I've had one or two runs where I didn't feel like it ( a sign of over training) but the next day I was chomping at the bit.

It's been a couple of months since my last parkrun and I'd thought earlier in the week that if the planets were in the 'right' configuration I'd pop over to Oldham to see if I've recovered from Snod.

I had actually kept a beady eye on the weather forecasts most of the week, but I think either way I would have have got out there if it had been gales and rain;-)

This was my only my second run there, but after the first I had no doubt at that I would return and now I'm falling headlong into this course of 3 laps of wide paths with up's and downs and a nice little twist towards the end of the last lap.

It's not very well supported currently ( with only 32 finishers today) but I'll be very surprised not to see it grow come next spring.

I had a very pleasant and polite young man approach me enquiring after my f-lite 230's ( he was the eventual winner)

Today I had a few targets, the first being to improve on my time from September. I wasn't too sure at all what would happen and when we started off I was left behind biting the dust ( although being damp it was only figurative). So there I am lying in 15th or so, despite my Garmin on post analysis showing an uphill start speed best of 5:16mm

By the end of the 1st lap I'd worked my way up to 2nd and there I stayed feeling very very pleased with myself but not being complacent. I'd checked behind me at the start of the 3rd lap and didn't see any threat to my position,however, with half a k I was being passed and wondered where the hell he had come from! At first I thought he was on his 2nd lap, but quickly realised it couldn't be so.

I held on behind him and stayed within a distance should he falter that I could attack. The last hill up and diverting to the wooded section told me that my legs were gone and I'd have to settle for 3rd . Very happy with my performance today:-)

I especially enjoyed the warm down with 1st and 2nd down another lap and thanking the marshals on the way.

Splits :

3:57 4:17 4:09 4:16 4:18

Obviously from that data I'm not running at my optimum, which bodes well if I can put a string of parkruns together:-)