North East Running

Last year I got a sub-three marathon at Edinburgh . I looked at my training block for that race and made a few tweaks this year for my London effort. As always, in addition to doing a bit of online research, I picked the brains of some of the best runners I know. In particular a couple of runners who have ran sub 2:20 in the past and another who runs sub 2:30 who really know their stuff. Some bulleted notes: Started the training block having regularly done 21-25km every Sunday for some time just as 'the Sunday Long Run'. So this is a great starting point Worked hard for 14 weeks - a little longer than the Edinburgh plan Ran every day, but alternated hard efforts with easy runs. Put the effort in, then recover, then repeat. Kept a fast interval session in for the Tuesday (anything from 400 up to 1mi intervals) but put a longish tempo effort in for the Thursday. Worked this up from 10k to 16k through the training block Kept the Sunday Long Run at a decent pace (sub 4:30/km) - to...

  I've done 16 races now at 10k distance over the last 4-5 years. My PB has gone from sub-40 to sub-36. I got a PB last year and then again another just recently. 10k is a tough distance. With 5k, it can be argued that you can get away with going hard and trying to hold on. Try the same tactic over 10k and you can find that by half way you'll be too tired and the pace will just drift away. So, first things first - you don't get a PB unless you have the basics right: Make sure you are in good form - you are not going to get a PB if you not in your best shape Pick a race that is pretty flat and has a good surface - enter a hilly, mudfest of a 10k - you're not getting a PB Think twice about building your hopes up if the weather forecast has a strong wind predicted So, if the stars are aligning on the three points above - then it is down to (a) pacing stategy and (b) race preparation and (c) how much your prepared to push yourself. A. Pacing strategy Every world record from...

I pretty much ran every day through 2022. Typical week would be Mon-maintenance, Tue-effort, Wed-maintenance, Thu-effort, Fri-easy, Sat-parkrun, Sun-long-run. However, before Christmas I was absolutely knocked out with the flu. Terrible cough, shivering, having to wear 4-5 layers and waking up damp with sweat. There was no way I could run for nine days! My weight went from 78 to 73kg also. Xmas (lack of) runs I then had to consider two things (a) when do I start to run again? and (b) what amount of fitness I had lost? The first five days back I simply ran 8km slow runs. I still had a cough and when I stopped half-way through and at the end I found myself having to cough for 20-30s because of the cold air. Day six I tried to do 3x1km efforts keeping the pace below 4:00/km and just about managed this. Again coughing at the end. Day eight I decided it was time to return to the normal training schedule. My three parkruns leading up to having the flu were: Riverside 17:48 (fast course) Orme...

One of the best running websites is Power of Ten where you can look through all of your races over the years. Looking at my performance card below it shows how my running has developed - from 2015-2017 doing only parkruns and going from just over 20 minutes to just under 19 minutes. Then slowly doing road races from 10k up to marathon.  Power of Ten performance card I thought it might be interesting to put my PB times into the WAVA calculator to assess which distance was my strongest. https://www.fetcheveryone.com/training-calculators-wava.php   " Age grading looks at world beating times set by people of all ages to work out what someone of your age and gender is capable of. World class athletes score close to 100. The rest of us won't be so high, but you can use this tool to see which distances you've excelled at; and which ones need some work ." WAVA calculator Below is a chart of my WAVA scores - this levels things up and shows, relatively, which my strongest dist...

Over the last few years I have ran quite a few road races and loads (170+) parkruns - but I have done very few races on the track. I fancied getting a decent 1500m effort on my Power of Ten record so put my name forward for a local club event. This then left me with the questions: What time do I want to aim for? What is the race strategy to get that time?  In terms of a target time, I know that if I run a really good parkrun (5km) I can get 17:30 which is 3:30/km. So a 1500m at 3:30/km should be comfortable - which would equal a 5:15 1500m. I also like round numbers - so going for a sub 5 minute 1500m seemed like the target to go for. This would need an average of 3:20/km pace. A 12x400m interval session is always a good indicator as to what speed you can run at. Two screenshots below show sessions I've done this year (a) with the club on a proper track and (b) on a lunchtime on a bit of flat tarmac. The track efforts where at 3:10-3:15/km pace. The lunchtime efforts where at 3:15-...

Did it. 2:58:29 To read about the training plan and the back story check out the post below: https://northeastrunning.blogspot.com/2022/05/sub-three-hour-marathon-training-plan.html In summary though - train (really) hard + get your nutrition right. The plan was to try and average just under 4:10/km throughout. Gels at 30 mins. 100ml water at each stop. If it went dream like I'd be around 2:55:00. If I fell of a cliff with 8km left I might hang on to 3:00:00. And... (Weather was perfect in terms of wind - maybe slightly too warm - pretty flat throughout - no more than +100m of climbing over 42km) Overview Not bad pacing - lost it a tiny bit at the end So breaking it down into the splits - the first 35km were pretty much spot on. The adrenlin, the reasonably easy three weeks leading up to the day, it felt a bit like a hard training run. Even had the chance to chat a little and just concentrate on a good technique and taking the gels and the water. Then for km 36 and 37 I started to ...

Just about ready to do the Edinburgh Marathon - desperate for a sub-three hour time. Learned two things from a failed three hour attempt at York  (3:05:05) - (A) Train harder and (B) Take energy gels every 30 mins and not every 45 mins. This is what my training plan was... Build up the base fitness Put in seven hard weeks of good paced increasingly long, long runs Three weeks of easing it down Step 1. Build up the base fitness To do a sub-three hour marathon you have to be a pretty good runner to start with. So the assumption here is that no one would start this plan unless they have a half-marathon time of comfortably within 1hr25. That would be the first milestone before starting this plan. I did 2-3 months of easy paced 25km (15-16mi) Sunday runs. This was part of a 75-85km (50mi) training week mixing fast sessions with easy sessions. A typical 25km run was as follows. Around 5:15/km pace, maybe slower if it's hilly. But doing 2-3 months of these every Sunday gives the base that...

I absolutely love parkruns and try to do lots of different locations and also when a new one comes out in the area I need to run it as soon as possible. However, I'm always quite keen to know the route and also see what the elevation profile is. The parkrun event website's are good - but not that good. No elevation and the route map is very hard to follow. So this blog post shows how to do a bit of research before you turn up (and it works for any race to be fair - not just parkruns). Both tips below use Strava Segments as the source of info - the first is when there is a full strava segment of the course and the second when there is not. 1. Option 1 - Full Course Strava Segment If you are lucky then the Strava Segment Explore will show the full parkrun as a segment. This particular feature of Strava seems to only bring up a limited amount of segments in the area - but fingers crossed there will be one for the course. The screenshots below show my research into Meadowmill parkr...

Back in January 2021 I posted a training plan for the year along with some target times I was hoping to hit: -  https://northeastrunning.blogspot.com/2021/01/running-training-plan-for-2021.html Reflecting back 12 months later, I think I got things just about right and will keep the same plan in place for 2022. In summary: Alternate easy run days with hard workout sessions Race or parkrun at the weekend Long run where possible at the weekend One rest day each week In terms of distance, works out roughly as 60km a week - around 3,200km per year. Ideal training week - 2 workouts, one race, one long run The good news is that this plan gave me personal bests at all of the distances I raced at: parkrun - 17:40 (Herrington)  5k - 17:40 (Sunderland) 10k - 36:26 * (Hexham) 10mi - 59:33 (Brampton) HM - 80:34 (Sunderland) * I recorded 35:44 at Town Moor for 10k, but course measured short and runbritain ruled as invalid - which was a real shame, as a sub-36 10k would have been something t...

I've been delighted to get four PBs in a month at the back end of this year. 30th October - 17:40 parkun 31st October - 36:26 10k 14th November - 35:44 10k 21st November - 59:33 10mile I've kept my training reasonably steady now for 18 months. Two hard workouts, two easy sessions, ideally a race and a long run each week. I think that two things have contributed to hitting what is the best form I've ever reached: Return of parkrun Running parkruns regularly every Saturday morning at race pace is a great way of keeping sharp and having something to target every weekend. Since the COVID restrictions were lifted at the end of July I've gone from around 18:25 pace to 17:45 pace on a flat course. Around the 18 min mark is also a time that will result in a few wins at parkruns with less than 200 runners - this buzz is always a nice incentive to give it that extra bit of effort. The marathon training in the middle of the year For around 18 months now I've done a HM long run...