Saturday, January 23, 2016

Week 3 Progress

Week 3

Date
Miles

KM
Time Avg
Pace
(Min
/Mile)
Avg
MPH
Elev Gain
(Mtr)
Elev Loss
(Mtr)
Calories HR
Zone
Avg
HR  
15th Jan Rest day
16th Jan 14.50 23.34 02:51:57 11:50 5.1 443 440 1,667 2 143
17th Jan 7.00 11.27 01:21:17 11:36 5.2 167 205 780 1 137
18th Jan Rest day
19th Jan 6.50 10.46 01:10:44 10:53 5.5 96 98 832 4 153
20th Jan Rest day
21st Jan 8.5 13.68 01:34:56 11:10 5.4 167 82 1,111 3 154
Week 3 36.50 58.74 06:58:54 873 825 4,390
Week 2 29.70 47.82 05:37:20 629 621 3,720
Week 1 30.00 48.28 05:51:27 629 580 3,633
TOTAL 96.20 154.84 18:27:41 2,131 2,026 11,743
To go   1,153.80 1,861.16

I normally try to stick to the rule of not increasing weekly mileage by more than 10%, however the jump to 20% wasn't planned.  Sometimes you just need to go with the flow and see where you end up.

I needed to do something on Saturday morning which meant my 'long walk' route took me out along Douglas promenade rather than over my usual stomping grounds of Baldwin and Laxey. 

I joined the promenade just opposite the Queens pub at around 10:35am, right into the tail end of the new 5k prom run.  Despite the bitterly cold weather it certainly looked like everyone was enjoying it, and I regretted not entering myself.  Maybe next month!

At the end of the promenade I headed out onto the old Castletown road, turned down the narrow road towards Port Soderick, took a left along Marine Drive, down onto the quay, back along the promenade and back up into Onchan. 

I only planned on doing 12 miles rather than 14.5, but it would have been a waste to stop the watch and slowly walk the last  2.5 miles home.  It was cold too, so I wanted to keep moving at a good pace.

Sunday was meant to be an easy recovery walk but, as I mentioned in my previous post, it was far from it!  I felt fine at the start, just a little tightness in the hamstrings from the previous day, but I found I was having to push really hard to get my heart rate up to around 135.  An average pace of 11m:36s miles for what's meant to be a recovery walk is pretty quick for me.

This walk took me out on the Onchan coast road towards Groudle, following the MER tracks all the way to Liverpool arms and then left back into Onchan.  It was a dark and misty morning and because I knew I would be walking on roads (there is no pavement from Groudle up to Liverpool Arms, or on the descent towards Whitebridge in Onchan) I was wearing Hi Viz clothes.

Almost every car that I saw had their lights on as the visibility, particularly between the Liverpool arms and Onchan, was only a few hundred yards. 

I'm going to get on my soapbox now. 

Despite the dismal conditions I saw 2 cyclists out training on this road, or at least I assumed they were training because they were wearing full lycra.  What astonished me the most was their lycra was a black/grey colour, they had no lights and absolutely no high viz.  No sooner had they past me and I turned around (more of a double take), they had disappeared into the mist.

I don't really know why I was surprised because I see this every day.  Maybe it's because I wasn't in my car so had a higher appreciation for the poor visibility.  Why is it that for some reason almost all cyclists on our roads like to wear the same colour as the tarmac no matter what the weather is like?  Does it make you go faster?  Does it look cool?  Or is it just that the Lycra companies don't make them in whites, reds, yellows, oranges etc?

I admit, I don't always wear high viz or bright colours, but whenever I know my route will take me off the pavements and onto the road I do.  

As a case in point, I have just this minute (15:20 on Saturday afternoon, so turning quite grey now)  come back from dropping my wife down into Douglas town centre.  I must have passed at least 10 walkers, dog walkers and runners.  All of them were on the pavement and all were wearing either yellow, pink or orange high viz jackets, or white or orange T-Shirts.  I also passed 3 cyclists.  2 were on the roads, dressed in black, with no lights, and the 3rd was actually over on Douglas promenade, away from the road, but wearing Hi Viz!

I don't have a problem with cyclists, they have as much right to be on the roads and out training as  anyone, I just wish they would stop for a moment and think if dressing all in black is really the smartest thing to do. 

Please, and this isn't just aimed at cyclists but to all walkers and runners too, "Be safe... Be Seen", especially if you are on the roads.

Okay, I'll get off my soapbox now.

As I was saying, the easy walk on Sunday was far from easy, and no matter how hard I tried I couldn't hit my max heart rate of 187 on Tuesday.  This made me realise I needed to set my zones based on my walking max heart rate, not my running max.

I also want to clarify that during Tuesday's hill session I wasn't intending to go all out to hit my max.  That's not the objective of a 'Zone 4' session, and is not something you should try and do every week.  In this zone you should be looking to just get above 85% for a few minutes at a time rather than to  hit 100% !

For my final session of the week on Thursday I finally plucked up the courage to meet up with some fellow Parish Walk addicts who are much quicker walkers than me. 

I do often train with others at the weekend when the distance is longer and the pace is a little slower, but I have always avoided the quicker mid week sessions for fear of holding everyone back, or having to run / develop bad technique just to keep up. 

It's often said that to walk quicker, you have to train with quicker walkers, so thanks to Jock, Dave, Andy, James and Ray for letting me tag along.  It was a good session so I'll be back for more!

That's all for week 3.  I hope everyone else's training is going to plan too!


1 comment:

  1. I would just wear the high viz all the time because occasionally you have to change routes/plans etc.

    ReplyDelete