Platypus' Beginners Guide to Running

Thanks guys, still totally chuffed with myself right now

Buckster, I was cursing under my breath at damp lanes and leaves on the road, I know you had spikes but still XC in the wet's hard work so very well done.

PermaBanned, all hills are the worst :) Looks like an odd course they had you running in circles, did that not get confusing when going the opposite direction to others?

That reminds me, had one idiot at the start almost trip me...he was running with his elbows out horizontal to his chest, in what looked like an attempt to force space around him, and crossed straight across the front of me but wasn't running faster than me so I had to slow else go into the back of him. I've really got no race experience under my belt as only done 2 10ks before this, but never experienced that before. Mostly people respect a sensible amount of gap even when moving through traffic.
 
9.25 miles in 1H:18
Coming down with a cold, damn well hope it is gone by race day!
I'm pretty much decided on a 3:30 goal if I feel good and the weather plays ball.
 
Tuesday was a rest day, Wednesday I did 6.5m with 2m at goal pace, Thursday was 5.5m with some strides, today was 10.0m.

1 week to go, so I will do a few 4-5 mile runs this coming week and have few more complete rest days.
 
Richmond marathon, virginia.

I've decided on 3:30, 8:00min a mile. Sounds daunting when I look at what a lot of my long were paced at, at the same time if I look at a few key fast runs then it should be fairly conservative and it is the faster runs that are the useful predictors. Just a little apprehensive how I will feel mile 22 at this pace. Lack of experience getting to me.


My legs have been doing a lot of weird things this week, pains aches and cramps while I only ran 60% of my peak Weekly miles. This is supposedly normal but it is disconcerting when you can run 70mile weeks with 22m long runs and I tense intervals and simply get DOMs, now I am barely run. And get hamstring aches, runners knee. Every few days it has been a new symptom. I guess my body is just rebuilding damaged muscle, joints and ligaments while it isn't stressed by training.

I've added a few strides to some easy runs and that seemed to help clear the legs of the worst of these weird symptoms.


Going to drive the course this weekend.
 
Best of luck D.P. Fingers crossed you'll feel better come race day and the rest should do you some good as well. All the best. :)

Ran my first XC race today, forgot my Garmin so unsure of the time yet but will check the results later. Was a few hills within the course and once the juniors and women had been racing it all morning it was pretty wet and muddy by the time the senior men started racing at 2.30!! Thank good I had spikes this afternoon otherwise I imagine I will have ran much slower or fell over!!

3 lap course, went out a little to quick on the first lap, started suffering on the secnd but held up and then felt like I lost a bit of pace on the last but happy overall I guess with my minimal running over the last two months (hamstring injury, still not great).

Have another XC race next weekend on a flatter course I'm told so hopefully I can have a stronger week in training this week and will be more mindful of my pacing.

Edit - Results are in 41.33 over a 6 mile course. I'm happy with that all things considered. :)
 
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All the best DP, hope it all clears up so you can have a stress free week and race day.

IndigoGorilla, Well done on your CX that sounds like an amazing time considering the terrain.

Hoping to get out for a 10k race next weekend which'll be a repeat of my 1st ever race from last year, hoping to make a marked improvement on the hilly 47mins.
 
Cheers Itchytrigg. Have 6 more XC races between next weekend and February, hoping to break 40 minutes in any of them as I know if I can get sub 40 at 6 miles of XC it puts me in a good position to break 40 minutes at least for 10K, currently 12 seconds away!!

Good luck in your race next weekend too, be good to repeat the same race and see how much you can improve.
 
I'm starting to run a bit more now and thinking of a Garmin watch rather than using my cycling specific Garmin Edge in my pocket.

I could buy the most basic one but does anyone know which is the cheapest that works with a HRM?
 
daveski said:
I'm starting to run a bit more now and thinking of a Garmin watch rather than using my cycling specific Garmin Edge in my pocket.

I could buy the most basic one but does anyone know which is the cheapest that works with a HRM?
Click to expand...

I have a refurbished Garmin 610 that works with a HRM strap. It is about as cheap as you can get. I really like the watch and the HRM worked well for months before it started giving weird flaky readings. I have a replacement strap coming so hope that works.
The 310XT is also an older watch that works very well, cheap and works with the HRM.


Newer versions have a built in optical HRM. Things like the 235
 
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I have the Garmin Forerunner 15 which works with my Wahoo tickr just fine. I got the watch about 9 months ago now I think, at the time I thought it was only the cheapest 10 which did not work with HRM.

It's is Ant+ only
 
I had a 310XT for a while but sold it earlier in the year.

Could never get the Ant+ to work properly and wasn't running much anyway.

Think I'll order a 15 and hope I'll have more luck with Ant+ this time.
 
Signed up for the Edinburgh marathon last night. This will be my second marathon and clearly the target is to beat the time from my first (Windermere, 3hr 35m). Will be following the lowest mileage plan from 'Advanced Marathoning'....
 
Saw the physio yesterday, think what i have is essentially early shin splints. Gave me a bunch of stretches and exercises to do to help with that and general stability, advised i go to a proper running shop to get some new shoes and showed me how to massage them as apparently my shins were incredibly tight. Pretty amazing how much of a different just basically rubbing your legs makes though, i could barely move the skin around on my lower legs but after two days of massaging them for around 20 minutes it's a lot freer.

Also generally advised not to stop running completely. I hadn't run since the 1st out of fear of causing more damage but apparently there's a lot of studies which say that detraining can be a lot more harmful in the long run. No pun intended.
 
5:40am, laying in bed after some cereals and bread. Soon time to head out for my first marathon. It's hard to come to terms with the fact that I went through so many months of. Training and bad building before that, forcing myself out before sunrise to avoid the incessant summer het and humidity, pounding away around 1300 miles, countless long runs, chest busting intervals sessions, DOMs, etc, and it all comes down to 1 day!
 
3:27:27, absolutely exhausted but extremely happy with time. Pacer was a nightmare so ditched him but perhaps too late. Very hard work from mile 16 with the main hills and very strong head wind.

Cramped badly at finish line, legs shot.
 
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