Monday, January 26, 2009

Raheny 5 mile

I did the Raheny 5 mile yesterday. The weather was just awful on the way there but luckily for the race it was perfect. The same could not be said about the weather for the junior's and kid's races!

I did it in 42:56 which is around what I had expected and predicted on Thursday. I could have been 20 seconds better, but I had to stop and tie my lace. Let that be a lesson for when I am going for a personal best.

It was a really enjoyable event and the goody bag was great!

So my next run will hopefully be a short one tomorrow night. If I get the time I hope to do some fartlek intervals to try and build up speed and help my aerobic capacity.

Thursday, January 22, 2009

The Run to Work - Today's Stats

Today's run was slightly shorter than before. It was 8.2 miles instead of 8.5. I didn't include the warm up part. I did it in 79minutes 49seconds which is a massive improvement of 15 minutes from last week. Average pace of 9.44 per mile.

My best mile was mile 6! How weird is that? I've just realised, I pushed it a bit to go until an hour for 10k!!! Makes sense now.

That's a good improvement. Roll on Raheny at the weekend and I hope to go sub 43minutes for 5 miles. I won't be near a personal best but anything until 45 I'll be happy.

Monday, January 19, 2009

Some People

I heard a question on the radio at the weekend. What popular board game was launched in 1955. The first 10 answers were Monopoly. Wrong. The 11th answer was Chess...

A short run

I got out lastnight for my planned 5k. I was lucky that the weather was kind to me. It was icey rain on the warm up walk to the park, but after I'd stretched and was ready to go the rain had stopped. The wind was strong but it wasn't overpowering.

I did 5k in 26.24 which I'm pretty happy with. I had my lap counter checking the mile times which were 8.48, 8.19, 8.22. That is a big improvement on the mile times from my long run, which were nearer 11.

I'm going to do my 8.5 mile run to work on Wednesday or Thursday and I am aiming for around 80 minutes. That is around 9.41 per mile which should be easily managed and it will be a 13 minute improvement on last week.

Then I hope to run the 5 mile in Raheny on Sunday.

Saturday, January 17, 2009

Running - Some Stats

I got my new Garmin Forerunner 405 and it is fantastic. I love numbers and stats so here are some from my last run.


























Distance8.53 Miles
Time94 Minutes 20 Seconds
Avg Pace11.03/mile
Avg Speed5.4 MPH
Avg Heart Rate159 BPM
Max Heart Rate176 BPM


It's a pretty slow time but it is great to see the stats. Tomorrow I'm doing a 3 mile or 5k run and I intend to have an average pace of 9 minute miles and then on my next 8.5 mile run I would like to take the time down by at least 5 minutes.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Oh dear

Times are getting tough and the government have decided to cut corners. So they've said public transport will be scaled back. That just isn't clever. Why can't the government see past the end of the year and think about the people who rely on public transport.

When jobs become scarce people will have to travel further and at different times to get there, but there won't be a bus service there for them.

Think people, think.

Monday, January 12, 2009

The Run to work

It's been a busy week, I haven't had a chance to write much.

Last week I ran into work, I'm not 100% sure what the distance was, I think it was somewhere between 9 and 11 miles. It took about 95 minutes. It was tough going, I think it was more mentally tough than physically tough.

When I'm on a normal run, if you don't feel up to it, you stop and head back home, normally I'm within a few kilometres of the house so it's easy to turn back. Running to work on the other hand, gives you a deadline and a destination. I've got to be in work at 9 and if I turn back I will be very late.

I think it's good practice for a marathon, it will help when I cross the start line with 26 miles to go, it will help me not to be overawed by the distance.

Sunday, January 4, 2009

Walking and running


Happy New Year. It has been ages since I last posted but with Christmas there just isn't any time for that sort of thing. I did get out for a few walks and a few runs. I got a couple of 10kms in and a 5k.


Not bad considering. On my most recent 10k I came across a huge grey squirrel. Check him out!
I took a picture of a heron today when I was out for a walk with Junior, but the zoom wan't great. It's a shame but I think I might bring my camera on my next run to see what wildlife I can capture.