Resting...

Few squats, lots of strength work with the dumbells and a couple of games of ten pin bowling! That's about it training wise. No running of course in a rest period which I'm really enjoying. Two weeks on Wednesday until I will start training for the Fell season. Right now I'm thinking about how I'm going to get into my best possible shape for the Summer's racing. I'll post a schedule as soon as I have come to a decision (I'm trying to seek help as well from various sources!).

End of season reflections.

It's been a hell of a season. Boy O Boy it has. It seems a lifetime ago since I set out in early September for the annual M.G.S Relays. It has been a very long season which has had plenty of highs and lows. The lows feel really low but it's worth putting up with them to feel on top of the world when your in good form.
My finest hours have definitley been Northern Schools (7th), North Yorkshire Schools (7th) and English Schools Fell Champs (10th). The lows certainly stand out, but English Schools itself dwarfs any other slight disappointments I have encountered along the way.
Well, what a journey. I've loved every minute of it through the good times and the bad. I'm ready for a rest though and I feel like I have earnt it. I'll have a few weeks off from running, just visiting the Gym before coming back, hopefully stronger and with a little more power, with a vengeance and some fire in my belly for the fell season.
It's also time to say goodbye to my spikes which have served me well this season but will sadly be replaced by some new shiny ones when I set out in September.

I needed a response...

And I didn't get one. Well, not quite.
Today was School Cross Country and I felt good pre-race. It was a very short race, only 2 and a 1/4 miles which wouldn't suit me but I still gave it a hell of a shot. I was found wanting on the first short lap, but worked my way into 3rd, only for my hamstring to cramp up on the 2nd lap on the way up the woods, leaving me to finish 5th. It's been a hell of a long season and I think this is merely down to fatigue rather than anything. So, Pinder, Mr Edward, Sinclair, Cairns and then myself was the order of proceedings. I felt excellent up until the point of hamstring destruction and was knocking on the door for 2nd.
This brings an end to the season which has lasted about 7 months (!). I'm delighted it's over and I can now have a well earned break before coming back for the fells!

Pumping some Iron

Despite having a race tomorrow, I decided to work on some more arm strength today with the dumbells. Besides, I will only be using my legs (well mostly anyway!) tomorrow so they shouldn't suffer as a result. I did lots, from lateral raises to hammer curls, but everything felt good and I hope this will be starting to help already. Tomorrow is my last chance of the season to run a good cross country race so I need to step up to the plate!

It's good to be back.

Yesterday's post: I manned up for a proper training session. I haven't had a good session for a week now so tonight I really went for it, even though I have School Cross Country on Wednesday. There is still a couple of days 'till then and if my body isn't strong enough to get it out of its system then there's a big problem.
So it was 6 x 3 minutes with 1 minute 30 recovery. I really wanted to hit a hard session out to really get rid of all the anger left from the weekend. This was certainly the session to release all that anger and agression. I actually got angry at the session itself and really went for it. When I started to breath more heavily, or my legs tightened I pushed harder. I pushed my body and mind beyond its limits. The results were good though!
I have done this session before and the maximum distance over the 6 efforts is 0.47 miles! Today I hit 0.51 miles over 3 minutes and got above 0.47 miles every time. This was a good return for all the effort I put in and shows improvement on the last time I did this session, which is like a triangular lap, so up a hill, down a hill and along the flat base and it's as many as possible in 3 minutes.
A good way to bounce back and I've proven to myself that I continue to improve, but the real response needs to be produced on Wednesday at School Cross Country where I can really show people what I can do.

You can tell how good an athlete is with how he bounces back after a bad day

If this cliche is right then we will find out how good I am on Wednesday.

Sunday Blues

I'm still reflecting on a really disappointing day yesterday. I felt like I let the team and North Yorkshire as a whole down as well as Mum and Dad who came all the way to watch. On the other hand, I was simply very unlucky and had things gone my way, in terms of not having had a cold in the build up and having not been tripped in the race twice (!), the complexion may have been completley different. I could have been feeling proud today with a really good performance behind me which saw me beat many of my fellow rivals. Instead I have a load of muddy clothes/shoes, some cuts on my knees and a big fat DNF. Still, time to put that behind me now and look towards School Cross Country on Wednesday which is the last race of the season (thank god!).
Today I did a weights session and a bike ride. Nothing too spectactular, just around 45 minutes on the weights and an hour on the road bike, but felt good in both. I will go out tomorrow for a run of some sort (maybe a hard session) as I haven't run properly now since last Sunday when I had that superb run over the 8 mile long run. Boy that seems a long time ago. This time last week I was really up for the English Schools race itself after such a good training session and thought I was in the form of my life. How quickly things change.

Could things have gone any worse?

It was a great weekend with the North Yorkshire team. I met some great people and there was some great banter. I had almost forgotten about the race on Friday night after a trip to the Trafford Centre. Still, the race had to be done and it wasn't good at all. I still felt a little under the weather having had the virus this week but I didn't want to miss a race as big as this. It was obviously going to be tough enough, but being involved in a 10 man pile up on the first bend made matters really bad. Still I got up, brushed myself down and ran on. I pulled a few runners back who had forged their way in front of me, but my legs did feel really dead and the going was ridiculously muddy! Being tripped again was the final straw and this time I'd had enough, and so called it a day. I couldn't believe the bad luck I'd had. Never mind. Always next year!
Today I am going for a bike ride with Dad and I am also going to do some weights in a bid to try and bulk up over the Summer for next season. All the lads at the front yesterday were massive and the strength is definitley something to work on. On Wednesday, we have School Cross Country which I don't really want to do but I hope to put the weekend behind me and finish the season in style. I may then have a nice easy few weeks where gym work is the main emphasis.

Lance who?

Instead of running yesterday, I went out on the road bike for the first time this year. Cycling seemed more attractive than a steady paced run and so the bike ride it was. The ride was nothing drastic, only 10 miles in fact, but I pushed up the hills very hard, out of the saddle and felt quite strong. The legs felt very good indeed.
I am definitley running on Saturday as I don't want to miss the opportunity of racing for my county in a prestigious event. I will either be very fresh/rested and have a blinder or, having not done as much as intended this week, will be found wanting for fitness and finish pretty much last! Whatever happens, there will be some great banter and it will be a great experience!

Lady luck smiles!

Well thankfully, after a good night's sleep, I am feeling much better. The cold is on its way out for sure; There are no aches in the legs anymore and the nose, which admittadly does become blocked at times, can easily be cleared. I won't try anything stupid today like an Interval session as it could allow the cold to come back. Instead, I will do a steady 6 miles or so just to get the legs moving again and get the last proper run in before English Schools.

Absolutley gutted.

After Sunday's brilliant session, I felt really good and was in a great mood, really looking forward to resting down for English Schools. Unfortunatley, I developed a nasty sore throat which has since turned into a cold, as I first feared. My legs feel dead and I have a headache as well as the standard blocked up nose. So yeah, on the hole I feel pretty shitty, hense the lack of blog posts over the last couple of days. I have been giving my body the best possible chances to fight this bug off by resting and drinking plenty of fluids, but I most certainly won't be running at EGS Relays tomorrow. I hope I have had the worst of this god damn thing today and feel better tomorrow so I may be able to get the last session in before the weekend. I live in hope!

The sweet smell of success.

Today I planned to do a long run. By long, I mean putting some real miles in the tank and getting a solid start to the week which, after today, will be fairly easy in the build up to English Schools. With Friday's hill reps out of the legs and nothing hard planned for tomorrow, I decided to try and run this at a reasonable pace. Naturally however, the intention was to get the miles in rather than to try and break the land speed record.
I programmed the Garmin for a steady 8 miles in 1 hour giving me a pace of 7:30/mile. Theoretically I knew I should be running faster, but this would hopefully give me something to pace a nice slow start with and enable me to kick on in the later stages of the run with plenty left in the tank. I was determined to not make the same mistake as yesterday and therefore gave my Breakfast plenty of time to settle. I set off at a nice steady pace but the Garmin was telling me that I was moving away from the 7:30/mile pace quite quickly. I thought to myself, 'to hell with it!' I was feeling very comfortable at the 7:00/mile pace I was operating at and so continued. There was some tough climbs in the first 2 miles or so which were on road but I felt to sail up them. The road soon became Canal towpath and despite being much flatter, the towpath was muddy and therefore not quite as fast as the tarmac.
I felt to be flying down the canal despite the severe headwind which did its best to blow me backwards at times. I have to say, I hate whoever designed the canal! The number of twists and turns it takes, unecessarily, are unbelievable! After running about 2 miles further than needed (!) I left the canal and the terrain was a muddy farm track which took a lot out of me. East Marton, the halfway point in the run was however very close now and so I stuck it out. I turned after 4 miles of running and began my journey home. I was back onto the dreaded farm track before I knew it and then the canal, twisting its way through the countryside, before hitting the road.
As soon as I hit the road, I kicked on in the hope that I could post a very good time baring in mind how good I had felt. Even though there was 2 miles to go (a 1/4 of the total distance!) I began to wind it up for the finish. 2 miles soon became 1 and as I glanced at my watch, I knew I was on for a very good time - 7 miles done in 46 minutes. Could I find an extra gear in the final mile and finish the session in style? Indeed I could, running the last mile in 5:47, giving me an overall time of 51:47 for 8 miles and a pace of 6:29/mile overall. I was ecstatic - for a run over all sorts of terrain with difficult undulations to contend with, this was a superb result.
I felt to be back at my best after what can only be described as a lousy run yesterday. This will give me a huge boost of confidence going into next Saturday and has really set the week up well. This was a long run made hard by the effort I gave in the last mile. It feels really good after having such a good/hard session to know you have an easy week ahead.
A steady run will follow tomorrow, before the EGS Relays in Aireville Park on Wednesday which will act as a great sharpener for the English Schools. Happy days!

Mission Accomplished

Having done all the hard sessions for the week, all I had to do was to complete a steady 1/2 hour run to see me hit the 30 mile mark for the week. Easy. Well, not so easy with hindsight, particularly with a killer of a session last night still well and truly embedded in the muscles. Instead, it was a rather painful 1/2 hour run this morning for more than one reason. Obviously my legs felt very tired still from last night, but I also only gave my Breakfast an hour to settle and so felt sick and later ended up with a stitch. Not good at all but I only have myself to blame and I sort of knew, as I left the house at 9.30am, that the Breakfast may come back with a vengeance. This sort of thing, I wouldn't repeat of course, in the build up to a race.
So the run wasn't much of a success and I couldn't follow up on last night's positive performance to finish the week on a high. To be honest, I felt like I have had a hard week of training; jaded, achey and generally not enjoying the run (ie looking at the watch in hope that it may be over soon!). I am not concerned at all though as this week hasn't been for the benefit of feeling great on a steady 1/2 hour run on Saturday morning, but rather for the English Schools XC Champs at Heaton Park next Saturday.

Super Six

Today I intended on having another day where I completed two sessions. I had planned to do the steady half an hour this morning in a free period but new strict regulations by teachers means these can now only be used for work purposes. Surely 'free' suggests they are available for any activities you want to do, within reason of course. It's like being in a Prison!

Anyway, after this disappointment, I set my heart on a hill rep session to be done at home after School. I felt bored of speed work which has already been done on two occasions this week. A hill rep session was therfore genuinley sensible and completley acceptable in the grand scheme of things.

The rep session took place on the hill in the photo. I set out with the intention of doing 6 miles worth to help me on the way to a 30 mile week. The planned 6 miles would see the 1/2 hour run tomorrow morning see me reach this milestone.

Of the 6 miles , at least 5 and a half miles were spent doing the reps! It was about 1/4 mile out to the hill and the same back so I was giving it 'death' for a hell of a long period. The hill is reasonably steep as you can see and flattens off at the top which makes you give that extra push in the final stages of each effort. I would say I did around 17 reps and possibly more (I lost count I was so knackered!). I timed the 10th effort at 50 seconds and the last at 50 seconds so I was very pleased with this consistency. I felt back at my best today after feeling a little jaded earlier in the week in the speed sessions. The legs were well and truly recovered and I got some arm action going which really propelled me up the hill; A great session! Tomorrow I will get the steady 1/2 hour run in which I longed for this morning, and that should complete a very good week mileage wise.

P.S. A.S. Levels came out yesterday giving me two A's (Biology/Chemistry) and a B (English Lit). I was very disappointed with the B as I felt I had done more than enough to deserve and A so I will be going down the route of a resit or possibly a remark. Town play Norwich tomorrow (currently top of the league) which could prove to be a huge turning point in our season!

Pictures from the Northern's.

The square root of 16 is...

4 I hear you shout.
Square is very relevant when describing the session I did today. The top field at School is square and so it has its lines painted in a square shape. I used these lines to produce an interesting and challenging speed session today which consisted of: Run 1 side of the square hard, jog the base easy. Run 1 side and the top hard, jog 1 side and the base easy. Run 2 sides and the top hard, jog 2 sides and the base easy. Run the whole square hard, jog the whole square easy. This may sound complicated but in reality it isn't and if you saw it you would definitley understand what I'm waffling on about. Perhaps you can even visualise it now! Anyway, one would of course be too easy, so this was to be completed 4 times - hense the square root of 16 - 4! After half a mile of warming up, I was raring to go.
I generally felt pretty good throughout and began to find the legs for the job in hand (ie running fast) towards the 3rd and 4th set. The session went surprisingly quickly as I was always focusing on the next effort and taking each one as it came rather than, as with a normal interval session, being overwhelmed by the number of efforts to come. The efforts varied in length, from the shortest (one side of the square) being around 90m to a full lap of the square around 350m. I did time the full square (350m ie. very last effort) on the last set and set a pleasing 58 seconds. My only slight complaint about the session was that I did not feel fully hydrated. This came as no surprise however baring in mind I hadn't drunk since Breakfast and I was doing this session at 2pm!
After refuelling and recovering, I was out under the setting Sun (6pm) for a lovely half an hour trot to top the mileage up. I set off at a reasonable pace and felt superb; hilly, flat, muddy or tarmac, I handled everything very well and as a result the pace became brisker and brisker. As I hit the 20 minutes mark I decided to tone things down a little and focus on warming down after the day's training. With this, the mileage for the week crept just above 20 miles. With another similar day's graft on Friday, I will hit that 30 mile mark I have been seeking since I set out on Sunday.

Playing with speed

Today I decided it was time to work on the thing that has let me down in the past few races. I have been producing some great performances (for me anyway!) up until the final stretch of the race where I fail to capitalise on the lead I have over my peers. Runners who I have passed in the race have come back to haunt me at the finish. It has really frustrated me. I could have been 5th on Saturday had I had a good finish. To counter this, it was therefore time for some Fartlek consisting of 4 200m bursts per mile, with 3 and a half miles worth. This would leave me with 14 x 200m efforts followed by 200m recovery.
The legs are still feeling the effects of Saturday but still felt much better than yesterday. The times I churned out are far from impressive for 200m, but they were easily fast enough for the last 200m of a race which is what the plan was. The terrain I was sprinting on was also very similar to that at the end of a Cross Country Race; flat and muddy. So forgetting about the times, which to a track runner would be laughable, I feel I will have definitley got something out of today's efforts which produced the following times:
1. 39 secs
2. 37 secs
3. 38 secs
4. 37 secs
5. 35 secs
6. 36 secs
7. 35 secs
8. 37 secs
9. 38 secs
10.35 secs
11.36 secs
12.35 secs
13.35 secs
14.36 secs
ALL TIMES TO NEAREST SECOND!
So as you can see, times varied from 35 seconds to 39 seconds. I felt to get into more of a rythm as the session went on and this is possibly why the times became more consistent. Either way, considering my legs aren't fully recovered, I feel fairly assured with what I have seen today. Hopefully I can produce something like this at the end of a race when it really matters now!
Along with a 1 mile warm up and half a mile warm down, the daily total reaches a pleasing 5 miles and after yesterday's 6, brings the weekly total to 11 after only 2 days. I am well on track to hit the 30 at the moment! Wednesday will probably be some Intervals in Skipton Woods and then a nice steady run in the afternoon. I shall look forward to that and hopefully, after a day off, my legs will be fully recovered from Saturday. Dad bought me Lance Armstrong's autobiography today; inspiring stuff!

You can tell you've had a hard race when...

You feel knackered on the recovery run that follows the day after!
Today it was all about flushing the legs out after yesterday's efforts to set me up for a solid week's training with no interruptions race-wise. It would have been very naive of me to run at Cautley today as, although it may have felt good had I ran well, I probably would have been too fatigued to get a good week in before tapering for English Schools. In hindsight, I think I may well have been well down the field at Cautley anyway based on how I felt on a recovery run, never mind a race!
Another beautiful day today weather wise; glorious sunshine and although a little chilly, there was no wind whatsoever. I couldn't wait to get out there this morning and enjoy lovely weather and scenery. Although I enjoyed the scenery, the same cannot be said for the run. I felt dead, low in energy and sluggish. This can of course be put down to the sheer amount of energy expended yesterday. In the end, I cut it short of the intended hour, clocking up a worthwhile 50 minutes or so and 6 miles in the process. Very slow but exactly what the doctor ordered and I will no doubt feel much better tomorrow now I have had a proper warm down.
The week ahead will be a tough'un which will hopefully see me hit the 30 mile mark. I may get out tomorrow for half an hour or so, hopefully a little more brisk than today, but the real training will be on Wednesday and Friday. Don't be surprised to see another couple of 'double dosages' on both those days!

A great day.

Today saw the Ermysteds team travel over to Stockport for the Northern Schools Cross Country Championships. A rather prestigious event, the 'Northerns' attracts schools from all the North such as Lancaster Royal Grammar School, Manchester Grammar and of course ourselves as well as many more. We took various age groups along today. From year 7's to year 13's, we were out doing our bit in the School colours.
The weather started off rather dull but it picked up as the day went on. There was plenty of time for it to pick up in sunny Stockport as our race was at 3.45. We arrived there at around 12.30 (!) so rather a lot of waiting around to say the least. It was good however to watch the youngsters battle it out and enjoy their running. Admittadly our race couldn't come soon enough and I couldn't wait to get it out of the way. After the rather tedious wait, the time came to start warming up. The sun was shining and the outlook was generally very positive. I felt full of energy having stoked up on Porridge, Toast, Lucozade, Jelly Babies, Flapjack, Marsbars, Bananas and Soup pre-race. Any worry of bonking had surely been well and truly banished by such consumption.
The race started at a frantic pace. The course was a short lap, followed by two longer laps, totalling a distance of just over 6km. The short lap was simply a run round a cricket pitch, so as you can imagine very flat but the race began to take shape and the field spread out. I set off steady with the intention to pull through and so was quite far back, possibly in the late 20's after the short lap. The first long lap was where the race began for me. I picked runners off one by one and worked my way into 11th by the end of the first long lap, still feeling very strong indeed. I pushed on further and by the killer of climb on the 2nd lap, which hadn't caused too much pain on the first long, had climbed into 5th. All I had to do was hang on but the long finish found me wanting. Ironically, I was reeling the man in 4th in but the two lads behind flew past, leaving me to finish 7th.
7th out of a field of 50 was a brilliant result for me; underage and running against stronger lads who, in some cases, may have even had 2 years on me! I was disappointed not to hang onto 5th but the two who passed me deserved their placings for their 'kamikaze' style finish. Up front, Billy Pinder eased to victory by 15 seconds whilst behind me, Alex Sinclair fought hard for 9th and Will Crisp 11th, giving us Team Gold. Unfortunatley, we couldn't retain our overall School title, which went to Lancaster this time. Always next year though!
I intended on going to Cautley tomorrow but I suspect I will be feeling the effects of today. So call me soft or sly but, whilst I am going for a nice steady trot tomorrow, I will be thinking of all the Wharfedalers burning out their lungs on the Howgill Fells!

What a difference some sunshine makes.

Well, nothing major to report today other than 15 minutes of Strides and Jogging, as well as the beginning of the Carbo Loading for the weekend's races.
Saturday is Northern Schools at Stockport. I have run this race every year bar one and so know the course well. There is one very tough climb (which we will go up twice!), some nice downhill running in some woods and a bit of flat running over sports pitches so it's a great venue for these Championships. I normally run well here due to the undulating nature of the course and therefore my history of results look pretty good:
Year 7: 55th place
Year 8: 13th Place
Year 9: 5th Place
Year 10: Did not run
Year 11: 11th Place
Year 12: ???
We shall see how it goes on Saturday. I intend on running on Sunday (if the legs are ok) at the Cautley Spout in Kendal Winter League series. Cautley Spout is one of my favourite races and I had a bad'un there last year, so I certainly have unfinished business in this area of the Howgill Fells.
I'm thoroughly looking forward to the weekend anyway. Let's hope this anticipation can be turned into some good results!

Business as usual

After yesterday's nightmare at Sedbergh 3 Peaks, I was keen to get my running back on track. When you have a day like I did yesterday, you can't wait for the next race or training session to come so you can put things right. Still slightly angry after yesterday, I went off on today's training run with intention.
I did a nice steady 15 minutes with a mate and then went off for a Fartlek session in Skipton Woods. Fartlek, meaning Speedplay in Swedish, involves alternative bouts of running at different speeds with little structure, depending on how you feel. The thing I like about Fartlek sessions is they are much less pressured or threatening than more structured Interval based sessions, yet they can result in just as much hard work. Today I used landmarks in Skipton Woods, like park benches, trees and bridges to start and finish my efforts as well as the odd natural feature, such as a hill. The length of efforts varied from around 20 seconds to over 2 minutes, but I reckon I did around 12 efforts all together in half an hour. I tried to avoid any hills, including Park Hill as I thought this may trigger the back spasms again. The back held up well overall; there was the odd tightening and the like but nothing as alarming as yesterday.
I finished off with 15 more steady minutes, topping the time up to an hour and the distance to around 7 miles. A good day's training after a bad day yesterday. I felt nice and strong throughout which was pleasing and despite my legs feeling stiff this morning, they were fine whilst doing the session.
Saturday is of course Northern Schools, which Ermysteds regard as a big fixture in the calendar. I guess it's a good chance for the team to win another prestigious event and we also look to retain the 'best overall school' trophy which we won last year . I will give it my best shot and we will see where that takes me.

The source of yesterday's problem.

After speaking to Tim Edward, a teacher at school and also a very good fell runner, I have managed to find the cause of yesterday's torture. After finding out about my lower back problems, he immediatley said, 'Have you been doing any core conditioning stuff?' I immediatley replied 'yes', as I have been doing this strength and core work over the past couple of weeks. 'Ah, it will be that causing spasms in the bottom of your back; Too many situps and the like leave your core too strong for your back muscles. Either cut down the number you're doing and build up slowly or cut the core stuff out completley. I had the same problems at Kilnsey a couple of years ago.'
So there's the answer! Having not suffered with this problem before, Tim's suggestion makes perfect sense. I'm glad I know what is responsible anyway and I will certainly address this by cutting down on the core stuff. He also mentioned some excercises which will work both the core and the back muscles, which in turn wouldn't lead to muscle inbalances. He is going to dig a sheet out for me which helped when he had the same problem. Until then, no more core stuff for me!

A bad day at the office...

A bad day at Sedbergh 3 peaks today. I had severe pains in the bottom of my back when climbing steep ground and as a result had to amble round, much slower than I would have liked. It was nice however, to take in the scenery with regular breaks, particularly seeing Pat and Graham at the top of Arant Haw to have a chat.
Would rather not dwell on this anyway. Long run tomorrow and then will probably rest down for Northern Schools on Saturday.