Running Diary WC 17th August 2020
Monday 17/08/20 – Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head
A new week and back to the Garmin Coach HM plan.
It all looks very good with its dynamic planning (i.e. it is supposed to adjust according to your performance).
The trouble is, you can’t tell it that you’re already doing decent mileage, so please jump to part way through. (Although it did ask me how often I was running and what my average pace was prior to creating the initial plan)
The upshot of this is I have short easy runs to start off with, ones that hardly seem worth getting a sweat up for…
(I do know that in weeks to come I’ll probably be begging for the nice easy runs again 🙂 )
…however wanting to follow the plan properly, and with the advice ringing in my ear that too much higher intensity running is not good for you, I ventured out in the for my ‘3 mile Easy Run’.
2 min warm up
3 mile – Easy (9:05 – 9:38 min/mile pace)
2 min cool down
Despite being only three miles, it probably wasn’t as smooth as it should have been, but the miles are under the belt, so onwards and upwards.
Tuesday 18/08/20 – 400 On 400 Off
OK, so I should have been doing another easy run tonight according to my Garmin Coach plan.
Incidentally, I chose Coach Amy as my virtual Garmin coach. I guess that is because, being married for over twenty years gets you used to being told what to do by a woman 🙂
This is one of the times I ignored what I was being told to do, so that I could participate in the running club’s speed session.
So after about a mile and a half warm up jog to our rendezvous point, the session was very simply 400 meters effort (approx 7-7:30 min/mile pace)…
…followed by 400m easy pace (9-9:30 min/mile pace)
After just over 4 miles of that, I had my mile and half cool down jog home.
I just hope Coach Amy is not too upset with me. 🙂
Wednesday 19/08/20 – Back on the Bike
Even though I might not be still following it to the letter, I try to keep the principles I picked up from Matt Fitzgerald’s 80/20 Running.
After all it has kept me injury free for longer than I can ever remember before, so why wouldn’t I?
And one of the aspects Matt talks about is Cross Training.
Cross training if you don’t already know is just the idea of doing a complimentary form of exercise inplace of (or some times in addition to your running.
The idea being that you get the benefit of the exercise without the impact to the body that inevitably comes from running.
This is all a long winded way to explain why rather than doing the Easy Run outlined on my Garmin Coach HM plan, I instead did 52 minutes (13 miles) on the exercise bike.
Unfortunately the plan is not sophisticated to pick up that I replaced my run with the ride so has recorded I skipped tonights task..
Thursday 20/08/20 – Looong and Slow
It’s Thursday, which means it must be long run day.
2 min warm up
8 miles easy pace (9:05 – 9:38)
2 min cool down
All went without incident.
Friday 21/08/20 – Peddle to the Metal
Nothing scheduled in the Garmin Coach training plan, but to keep the body ticking over, I hopped on the bike for a steady 35 minutes.
My entertainment of choice for the ride tonight was my latest Kindle read.
All very civilised…if a little sweaty 🙂
Saturday 22/08/20 – End of week Garmin ‘Tired’ Run
Amy, my Garmin virtual coach, was being kind to me today and just had me doing 4 miles (to be precise, 2 min WU, 4 miles run and 2 min WD).
Took it VERY easy.
Didn’t exactly feel a million dollars, but hey, another day ticked off the plan.
