Adarq.org

26-01-18

Morning BW: 71.7kg [that consistency...]

Workout

Jog around, strides, some drills, and more jogging before race, about 1.5mi total

Race - 5k in 20:46.6 [unofficial, according to watch, shall see what the official record says this evening!] 
Splits - 4:15.0, 4:09.2, 4:20.0, 4:12.8, 3:49.6 [watch says the last split was .97km, but the course is licensed as/officially is 5k so I'll take the registry board's word here over my dumb watch]

Jog ~1.5 mi cooldown

Notes

Fuck yes. I was in the B group for people who estimated their finishing time at >22:00. I'd never raced before and my 6:31 mile from a couple of weeks ago led to my 5k time as being an estimated 22:07, so I went with that. Strategy was to just go out at something comfortable between 4:12-24/km [i.e. 21:xx pace]. About 15 people of >200 in the B group went out faster than me, but I'd overtaken about half of them by 1km.

After 2km there were just 5 ahead of me, as far as I could tell [i.e. unless someone was going like <19:30 pace or so]. At 2.5km the guy who had like a 50m lead after 1.5km really dropped off the pace and I snuck past him easily, so there were just two chaps ahead of me. They looked like they were having a hard time. After 2.5km my breathing started to get tougher but I was still fairly comfortable.

My strategy from 2.5km on was just to keep within 10m of the two guys running together who were leading the B group. This was not so tough and at about 3.95km I was within a couple of meters. I had started to breath pretty hard but I thought that with just 1km to go I could push a lot harder, so I blitzed past them. One of them was clearly struggling a lot more than the other. The chap who was doing better of the pair said "fuck, damn" as I passed -- I guess he thought he had the B group in the bag, haha. I pushed pace a little bit here. 4-4.5km pace began around 4:10 and I gradually pushed it to 4:00 flat. Then last minute, when I could see the finish line, I really pushed it. SPM climbed up to 210 and I hit a max pace of 2:44/km, but I probably averaged like 3:15/km or so for the last 45 seconds or so of the race. I wasn't sure where the race actually ended, to be honest. There was a narrow passage made w/ tape that you were funnelled through, and the beginning of it was marked with the 5km sign, so I assume that's where the race finished, but I didn't want to risk it so I kept pushing through to the end of that tunnel, and only hit my watch a couple of strides after it because I was too wiped to attend to that. Will be interesting to see what the official time is.

I was pretty pleased with the strategy. I'm pretty sure I won the B group because there was no one who was clearly in it ahead of me, though I'm not sure. If someone did beat me from the B group then they were seriously sandbagging hard, haha, but I guess I did too in the end, oops. But yeah, I had no concrete idea of what I could hit here beyond "probably 22:00 or so" so I was pretty pleased. I guess that I am probably already in shape to run a bit faster than this, given how much I evidently had left to push with on that last split. I mean if the last km is like 25 seconds faster than the average of the previous 4km then optimal pacing probably saves me some time, but w/e that was the first race. Sick.

Edit: apparently I maintained a sub 4:5x mile pace for the last 25 seconds or so of the race. Decent going after ~4.85k of racing.

Official result has me at 20:40, awesome.

24-01-18

Morning BW: 71.7kg

Workout

Run - 6.69mi in 1:02:33 [paces: 8:41*, 9:58, 9:23, 9:15, 9:42, 9:57, 8:05]

*Looking at the Strava map it looks like it fucked up and added a squiggle where the wasn't one to this first split, probably adding like ~150m or so to the run, meaning that first split was likely somewhere in the 9:3X and the run as a whole closer to 6.60mi.

Notes

Upper body still sore so shan't lift today. Probably means I won't have a proper lift until Monday as I don't think hitting the gym tomorrow would be overly sensible, and I'm pretty busy through the weekend. Will think about getting some chins and pushups, etc., done at home.

Run was solid. SPM was at 178 without much effort to maintain. Not going to try to push it up again, at least for a while, as the new cadence is requiring some adaptation, esp from my hamstrings.

It was hella windy today, too, like 20mph.

Pushed that last split for the experience of running hard on tired legs.

Tomorrow and Saturday will be basically total rest days, except for possible calisthenics. Sunday I'm going on a like 10 mile walk with friends, so probably won't need to run, but might have the urge in the morning anyway.

23-01-18

Morning BW: 71.6kg

Workout

Stationary bike -- 45 mins -- kept BPM low 130s and RPM low 90s [which I realise is same pace as a 180s SPM when running, nice]

Notes

Moderately sore all over. Might go to gym for an easy stationary bike session to get some blood flowing. Sleep is improving again.

Nice easy "ride", quads felt it for first 10-15 mins, but once the juices were flowing it all felt better.

man low-7's is a *run* for me. lot of work to do to catch up to where you're at. i'm avoiding joining strava because i spend enough time on social media as it is, so i'm just chasing your training instead.

 

yeah, adarq just dropped pretty much a casual 1:40 half on a "light" run, that's good shit for anyone.

in case anyone didn't know, i've been working from home the last few years.. my boss got an office ~30 min away, so decided to come in and work here today.

kinda fun.

lmfao!

wtf lol, this is one of the strangest things i've read. some great reversal in the force of nature is involved here.

21-01-18

Morning BW: 71.3kg [!!!]

Workout

Run - 2 mi moderate [9:06, 9:11], drills + strides [5x100 w/ jog recovery, about 5min/mi pace], 3 mi easy [10:50, 10:07, 9:41]

Just over 6 miles in total...sick

Notes

Slept from 5am to 9am, fuuuuck that. Was sleepy from like 9.30pm but could not get to sleep. Hopefully sleep resets a bit this week. Went for this run immediately on waking without eating. Was almost freezing temperature and a mix of rain/slush/snow the whole time. I need better gloves, because typing this right now is very hard.

Wore my Flyknits for this run. Like them a lot. Feel light on my feet, esp compared to the clunky things I'd been wearing otherwise.

Wearing more minimal shoes and running in the rain gave me a chance to work on stride rate. Only cue I used here was to just think about having quick ground contacts. Seemed to work! Watch says I had Avg SPM of 178 in the first two miles, then hitting ~225 during the strides, then 174, 176 and 186 for last three miles.

I think my wrist HR monitor was stride locked for this run b/c the efforts were not in line w/ the BPM readouts. I could recite a whole sonnet without much issue and it was telling me 175, lol. I think this happens when I just put on the watch right before running rather than wearing it around for a while and letting it get used to me again.

just searched those Adidas Ultra Boost ST's, seem crazy expensive (everywhere).

I've always heard good things about the Flyknit racers. These look slick:

[...]

I like the "knitting", looks dope.

Haha, yeah. I have been trying to work out where I got the Ultra Boost STs, because I definitely didn't pay that for a shoe!!! I think my mum got them for me to encourage me to run instead of lift at some point in the past. Well that eventually worked out...

I will admit I originally just bought the flyknits because I thought they looked cool and I could wear them as casual shoes when the weather was good, in addition to wearing them to the gym. I have this colourway:

19-01-18

Morning BW: 71.8kg [realised my preferred scale had just run out out battery, lol. Was 72.0 on the one I'd been using in the interim]

Workout

Chins
BW x 4
+10 x 2
+20 x 3, 3, 3
+10 x 5, 5

DB Incline Bench
12 x 7
22 x 9, 8, 7
16 x 10

BB Row
52.5 x 10, 10, 10

DB OHP
14 x 10, 8, 6

1.5 Style Lateral Raises
6 x 8, 6+3, 5+4

Later...

Run - 5.17mi in 48:48 [9:44, 9:08, 9:24, 9:44, 8:56, then jog last bit]
Avg HR - 159

Notes

Solid workout. Chins moving well, mostly just care about them tbh. I am just trying to keep muscle mass while dropping weight/fat to benefit the OAC chase and improve running. Kind of crazy to me that I will probably be under 70kg soon. Must be like well over 5 years since I've been that small, haha. Should be able to hit BW+40kg at under 70kg within a couple of months, I think. That'd be exciting.

Will put a run in later. Going to just keep everything easy over the next week until the race happens. Still building up mileage.

Run felt great. I dug around my drawers and found another pair of running shoes and wore them. My usual for running has been an old pair of Saucony Omni 13s. Today I ran in some Adidas Ultra Boost STs. I much preferred the feel of these, I think, they feel less clunky even though they're probably a touch heavier. I also have some Nike Flyknit Racers that I used for the track stuff last year and which are my go to gym shoes because they're much thinner sole so they feel great for stuff where I'm pushing through my feet (OHP, etc.) when I don't have my squat shoes on. They might be touch lightweight for me to run in right now, esp since on slow days I plod along a bit. I will wear them for the race and see from there. Sticking w/ the Ultra Boost STs for now.

Should note that the pace variation on the run was deliberate but not planned.