Platypus' Beginners Guide to Running

I ran a 12 Second Half PB yesterday. It felt very comfortable passing 10km in 43:30, I started to slow a bit after 12km and had to push hard in the last km, but got finished in 1:34:56. There were a few hills and I probably lost 30 seconds stopping at a water station. I think a 1:32-1:33 will be do-able on the right course in the right conditions.
 
On Saturday I went for a run for the first time in 2 months. My longest distance yet, a whopping 7.5km. It took me about 48 minutes. Legs are utterly ruined now.

My goal for next year will be 10km in an hour.
 
Daaaavvveee said:
Just finished my first half marathon! Managed it in 1:48(ish) Strava is always a bit inaccurate, waiting for the official chop times. But I am really happy with that!
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Well done. Under 1:50 is great.

Yesterday I did a Cross-country Marathon relay in a team of 4 from Salisbury to Winchester. It was extremely muddy and hilly. Probably the hardest 10km I've run. We came 3rd overall in 3:22m. I was really impressed with some of the marathoners running there.

Does Anyone know when the VLM ballot results come out, must be soon?
 
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Shamrock said:
This week.

A friend has already received the post saying he didn't get a place.

With 17,500 places available for 327,500 ballot entries, chances are a bit low!
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About a 1 in 18 then. I'm able to enter my running club ballot if I don't get a spot in the general one, they get 2 or 3 spots.
 
I had not realised the number of places was that low. So good luck to all those than entered! If I got in it would make sure I don't have a slack winter like last year, though I had a slack summer instead this year so.......
 
Congrats to anyone who got into the London Marathon, I'll be there cheering from the sidelines.

Have pre-race nerves myself at the moment, running the Chichester half on Sunday, my first time running this distance in a race. Have got my training in reasonably well, missed a long run and a tempo due to a cold a week or more back but not too many issues. Did a last minute entry to a local 10k trail run and came 3rd male on Saturday - BUT - now i'm lost, don't know what to do run wise or with food and am really worried I'm going to mess up, adrenaline already pumping- any advice for the last week before a half?

I've only run half distance a few times training and took it quite easily and finished in just over 1:37 and I would love to break 90 minutes which would most likely be a top 50 finish as the Chichester half runs up the Trundle at Goodwood which I've been training for.
 
BlastRadius said:
any advice for the last week before a half?
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Everyone's different but for a Sunday race I'd typically run a fast 5K on the Friday evening to loosen up the legs, rest all Saturday and eat lots of pasta. Morning of the race have breakfast, energy bar an hour before the race and a caffeine gel 15-20mins out. During the race I don't normally eat anything if it's a half or shorter but probably worth hydrating. Good luck!

Anybody have recommendations for running rucksacks? I've used a Deuter Race X for a while now and it's starting to get tatty. It's served me well so I could just buy another but I'm interested to know what else is about. Probably looking at 12-15L, separate zipped pockets for keys/phone/wallet are desirable.
 
Shamrock said:
Everyone's different but for a Sunday race I'd typically run a fast 5K on the Friday evening to loosen up the legs, rest all Saturday and eat lots of pasta. Morning of the race have breakfast, energy bar an hour before the race and a caffeine gel 15-20mins out. During the race I don't normally eat anything if it's a half or shorter but probably worth hydrating. Good luck!
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Thanks, good shout about the gel, need some more. It's funny, i'm normally very well prepared for everything, when I have a race my brain goes off track completely. This is the race that made me start running again so it's very important to me to race my best race.
 
Went for my first run in about 4 months today and it's probably not far off 8 months since i've done anything consistently. I've always been a fairly unfit person by nature and it showed this morning. Only did 2 miles but at a horrendous pace (20:25).

I've found a small park near us where just under 4 laps is a mile. Going to just keep going there and adding on a lap every run till i get back up to a decent level. It's quite good as it's quite square, 2 sides are flat with the other 2 slightly sloped so i get flat, down, flat up, etc


What i would like and i don't know if it's possible. Is for my Garmin to track my actual laps rather than class each mile as a lap.

I think i can build segments but can i do it over a small off road area like this?

gWk1Nct.png
 
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Marvt74 said:
What i would like and i don't know if it's possible. Is for my Garmin to track my actual laps rather than class each mile as a lap.

I think i can build segments but can i do it over a small off road area like this?
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Press the Lap button at the end of each Lap, then if you use Strava set the run type as workout. You'll get a graph like this https://www.strava.com/activities/1171597098 It won't track actual laps in real time tho. I've got an old Garmin 405, may be a way of doing it live on newer ones

Each block is where I pressed the lap button after 600m reps in this case
 
Marvt74 said:
Went for my first run in about 4 months today and it's probably not far off 8 months since i've done anything consistently. I've always been a fairly unfit person by nature and it showed this morning. Only did 2 miles but at a horrendous pace (20:25).

I've found a small park near us where just under 4 laps is a mile. Going to just keep going there and adding on a lap every run till i get back up to a decent level. It's quite good as it's quite square, 2 sides are flat with the other 2 slightly sloped so i get flat, down, flat up, etc


What i would like and i don't know if it's possible. Is for my Garmin to track my actual laps rather than class each mile as a lap.

I think i can build segments but can i do it over a small off road area like this?

gWk1Nct.png
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You can create a segment, but if it's a relatively tight loop like that then it might be a bit sketchy getting your runs to match to it.
 
Yeah, i used to have an old digital watch which let me use a lap function and i'd just press the button each lap but with my garmin being touch screen i don't want to mess around looking at the screen trying to touch the right spot.

Will just forget about it. Just thought it might keep it a bit interesting given it's a small lap which will get repetitive.

It's quite hilly near me so anything longer starts getting a lot tougher whilst i'm getting back into it and i don't want to drive to the canal each time.
 
Marvt74 said:
Yeah, i used to have an old digital watch which let me use a lap function and i'd just press the button each lap but with my garmin being touch screen i don't want to mess around looking at the screen trying to touch the right spot.

Will just forget about it. Just thought it might keep it a bit interesting given it's a small lap which will get repetitive.

It's quite hilly near me so anything longer starts getting a lot tougher whilst i'm getting back into it and i don't want to drive to the canal each time.
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I think you are going about the traing the wrong way.

Forget about timing yourself going around the same short lap repetitively.

Just go ut and run, forget about pace and time, just keep the runs easy and enjoyable with a gradual increase in duration. Effort level should be such you can easily hold a conversation without interruption for breathing. Don;t worry about hills, they are your friend, great way of developing more power without increasing impact forces. Once in a a while you could do a Park Run 5K to test fitness, or have a route that you try to go all ut on and can use as a baseline.


If you run the same laps constantly you will get very bored very quickly. If you are trying to run faster you will end up runnign too fast and will risk getting injured, especially if you are increasing distance as well as pace. Ignore pace. You will naturally get faster the more you run, especially if you run at a comfortable easy pace. Once you have been running for some time and have developed stronger bones, ligaments and tendons then you could start adding in something more focused on speed or power like fartleks. Keep easy runs easy and hard runs hard. About 80-90% of your running should be easy, almost 100% easy for a good 3-6 months at the start.

Don't race your training run, train slow and race fast to avoid injuries. GPS watches and Strava are terrible at making people do their training way to fast.
 
When the **** will summer end here :-(. I've been waiting weeks patiently for things to cool down but it only gets worse. On Sunday I tried to do a track workout but got only 4x800meters before I overheated and started feeling dizzy, humidex over 95F at 6am. No deal I thought, I will do some fartleks on my Monday medium LR. No dice, even hotter and I overheated at easy pace by mile 8. 84F and 92% humidity. That sucked so my i could only muster another easy run Tuesday because it was still nasty outside, runnign in the dark at 6am sweating buckets at recovery pace, shoes squelching in sweat by mile 4. Today I gave up on the weather and went to the gym, just to find their AC unit could not keep up with the heat and humidity and broke down, making the gym an oven. I had planned on 3 easy mile then 10x800m, after the 3m I was again risking over heating just doing easy pace on a friggin treadmill. Went back outside now the thunderstorm had cleared, 80F, 100% humidity and light rain. Aimed for Lactae Threshold run since there was no suitable runnign track and very wet road or intervals. first mile was OK but then same thing, just over heating, ended up doing 5 miles at Goal marathon pace sopping wet.

And the forecast shows at least a few more days of this horror story, even then the weather is still hot and humid AF, then it seems to get even hotter. By then it will be taper time and I will have finished this cycle with no quality LR(e.g. 20-22 miles with 12-14 at GMP), minimal track workouts and a couple of LT runs. The worst fall runnign season I have known.

Not much you can do, and always better being safe and drop a workout. Someone died at a 10K race not far from here in Sunday due to heat exhaustion, so i'm glad I binned my track workout. Winter can;t come soon enough.
 
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