From Marathon Eater to Marathon Runner

I’ve spent the remainder of the week recovering and now I’m able to give a bit more of a race report. Hope you enjoy.

Pre-race prep was to be an early night, but the only way I could fathom going to sleep early was to have a few beers, well it was Saturday night after all. So 4 bottles of bud later and I was ready to kip. I looked out my race gear, attached the race number to my shirt ( it had the chip on the back of it ) and I went to bed, eventually getting to sleep around 12pm. I was woken by the kids at 6:50am, they seem to get up earlier at the weekend! I was initially worried about this, then the more I thought about it the more sense it made. Normally I don’t run until lunchtime, so have been up and awake for a few hours. Todays run was at 10am, so a few hours of being up and awake would probably help.

I got my things organised, put my gear on and left the house at 8:15am to go pick up my brother. I arrived for him at 8:30am and we eventually leave the house and head to Bellahouston Park on Glasgow’s South Side. We park the car just off Nithsdale drive and walk round. We are near the start for around 9:20am and have a look around, for some reason we couldn’t see an Achilles Heal tent, but gave up fairly quickly and decided it was time to do our warmup. Graeme was going to warmup with the crowd but I wanted to stick to my plan of a 10 min jog. We both ended up doing that, starting at 9:35 and finishing at 9:45. It was then time to stretch and get ready to move to the start.

The runners had been split into separate sections so that the faster guys weren’t being held up. Graeme and I both estimated our finish times at 50-54 mins when we signed up, so we were in the Yellow area. I was hoping for a sub-50min run so we went to the front of the yellow runners so we didn’t get caught in the crowed. Graeme had run a 54:45 training 10k the week before and was hoping to do better, perhaps even a 50 min if he could stay with me. So I told him if he wanted, he could pace with me for the first few miles and see how he felt, if he felt fine then stay with me, if not drop back a bit. Since he didn’t train as much I didn’t expect him to be fit enough to sit at my pace. That proved wrong.

The gun goes off and I am now thinking about tying my laces, so before we cross the start line I have had to tie them twice to make sure they won’t come loose.

We get over the start line and we are off, our first 10k race is underway. Lots of other runners surround us but we are fairly quickly up to speed and running through Bellahouston park, concentrating on our own pace and not worrying about other runners is key here. Lots of folk go off far too fast. We exit Bellahouston Park and start to up the pace a little on the wider roads, I have to keep bringing us back down to nearer the 8 min/mi mark, as we were looking at 7:20 for a while. We completed the first mile in 7:58, perfect and a good start. The Garmin is brilliant for setting the pace. Eventually I will be able to do myself over shorter distances, but for this race it’s invaluable at the moment.

Mile 2 and we are coasting along, having a conversation as we go and enjoying the crowds cheering us on. We eventually leave the crowds as we cross over the M77 and head down Dumbreck Road towards Pollok Park. We are still comfortable and still having to keep our speed down, we complete Mile 2 in 7:52 min/mi pace.

The third mile takes us off Dumbreck Road and into Pollok Park, the first time I’ve run in Pollok Park and unknown terrain for me. We head up through the park on some small but longish hills. Nothing too hard here and we are overtaking quite a lot of people on the way up. Still chatting suggests we are well within the zone and we complete the 3rd mile at 7:54 pace. It’s time to start looking at moving up a bit now that we are at the 1/2 way mark so when we cross the 5km marker we bring the pace up to try and do a 7:40, I’m still keeping the pace at this point.

The 4th mile is done in the park and at a pace of 7:38, getting faster and have thankfully left some in reserve. I’m conscious of my run on the Thursday where I died with a stitch and that is worrying me a little. But I’m feeling good and comfortably could complete the remainder at this pace.

The 5th mile takes us back out of Pollok Park and onto Dumbreck road a bit further south than our entry point, we are still doing a good pace here and on for a 7:30ish min/mi, we pass the point we had previously entererd the park we are sitting happily coasting but I’m still thinking not to push to hard yet, still another 1.5 miles to go. I say to Graeme to bring it down a bit as he’s starting to go faster again, but he decides he doesn’t want to and as he was doing around 7:10 min/mi I let him go. I was happy to complete that mile in 7:32 min/mi pace. Graeme was still in sight, but was pulling away slightly as I maintained my speed.

Onto the 6th mile and my pace is increasing, as I start to push for the finish, as I come across the M77 I see Mosspark Boulevard and for some reason think this is close to the end, as the Womens 10k finished there. I quickly remember that it’s still a bit to go and find that we aren’t running along Mosspark Boulevard at all, but are continuing on Dumbreck Road. We finally enter the park and have a mild uphill section to complete. I am picking the pace up again here and start to feel the area that I got the stich becoming slightly aggrevated. I decide to bring it down slightly just incase I can’t make the finish. As I get to the top of the hill I see we have a nice downhill section then a straight and a small uphill to the finish. I ran down the hill very fast, probably sub 7:00 min/mi pace then turned the corner onto the straight. I had completed that mile at 7:23min/mi.

The final section, I have a short straight ahead and I am trying to conserve my energy for the final straight, but a runner goes past me fairly quickly and I decided I am going to give it another push. I ran the flat straight very fast then turned the corner onto the final straight and slight hill. I sprinted the whole length of that hill and about 20meters from the finish line I heard my Mum shouting “Come on Eoan” That gave me a boost, I stuck my arm up and gave a wave and pushed it faster, overtaking lots of people and finishing the final section with an average 6:26 min/mi pace. My fastest over this section had been 4:47 min/mi or thereabouts.

As I was trying to avoid a few of the finishers who had stopped on the line I forgot to press stop on the Garmin, so recorded a time of 48:02, but my official chip time had me finish in 47:54 which I am delighted about.

I met up with Graeme and found out he’d managed a 47:09 but had struggled at the end as he hadn’t banked on the extra downhill and straight section, he thought the top of the hill was near the end. A fantastic time considering he’s only covered the distance once in training I believe. He’s obviously a natural.

Summary:

Splits:

• Mile 1 @ 7:58 min/mi
• Mile 2 @ 7:52 min/mi
• Mile 3 @ 7:54 min/mi
• Mile 4 @ 7:38 min/mi
• Mile 5 @ 7:32 min/mi
• Mile 6 @ 7:23 min/mi
• Last 0.26 @ 6:26 min/mi

What I’d call a perfect Negative Split

Total Distance:

• 6.26 miles  @ average pace of 7:40 min/mi

Time:

• Runography - 47:54
• Graeme - 47:09

And for our next trick, the Great Scottish Run 1/2 marathon in September. I’ll be updating the site with notes on my training schedule for that run. Run On!

Having done a 2 mile easy run on Tuesday and not being able to resist, another 2 mile easy run on Wednesday it was all been building up nicely to my final training run. I completed my MHFS program yesterday with a bit of a flurry. I was meant to run:

• Tempo Run
  Dist: 5mi, inc
  Warm; 3mi@8:26; Cool

I’ve just noticed that this is the exact same run as I started on day 1 of this program, 11 weeks ago. An interesting point.

So how’d I get on? I started off the run and immediately decided I’d increase the distance to 6 miles. I was panicking about not being able to do the 10k at average pace of 8:03 min/miles to get me under my 50min target which is something I’ve been aiming for since I started running.

Instead of sticking to the plan I started running faster, without warmup I covered the first mile in 7:53 (it has an uphill and long downhill section), onto the 2nd mile and I’ve warmed up by this point and continue running at what I thought was a comortable pace, albeit quite fast. Not long into it and a quick check of my watch shows I’m on for a 7:15 min/mi 2nd mile, so I panic and start to slow a little, but not enough and end up completing mile 2 in 7:24 min/mi pace (fasted outdoor mile - daft I know). This worries me quite a lot as I have another 4 miles to go. I wanted to get to 8:00 min/mi pace too see if I can sustain it. The 3rd mile I again manage to do this slightly fast in 7:51 min/mi but I could feel it starting to bite, a lot of this mile was on a gradual uphill. My heart was pumping but I was determined to keep going. Onto mile 4 and I was feeling better by this point, I posted a respectable 8:05 min/mi and had slowed sufficiently that I thought I’d complete the last couple of miles at 8:05 min/mi pace. I was comfortable but knackered at the same time.

Mile 5 was where it came unstuck, 4.46 miles to be exact, I’m coming round and can almost see the home straight and feel a stitch starting in my stomach. Within seconds it’s too sore to carry on running, I tried to slow but it wasn’t happening, I had to stop then walk for a bit. It was a good couple of minutes before I could get back into a recovery/easy run pace. I decided to shorten the distance and go back to the gym at an easy pace. I covered another mile to give me a total distance of 5:57 miles. Total time: 50:54

I was very disappointed with having to stop as I would have been able to do my 10k training in under 50 mins. I had covered 4.46 miles in 34 mins. Looking at the data, I covered the first 3.68 miles in 28:34, which knocked 1:30 off my time for the same distance around strathclyde park, and that is mostly flat.

Hopefully the stitch was to do with diet more than fitness, I had a few beers the night before (I know, I know) and that morning I’d decided to have two weetabix instead of my usual apple/banana combo. I’d also drank a couple of cups of coffee instead of one cup of coffee and a litre of water.

If I can avoid the stitch and take it easy over the next two days I think I should have done enough to post a sub-50 min 10k for my first ever 10k race.

On the plus side, I kicked the smoking into touch on Sunday 7th June, so have been feeling the benefits of that.

After a bit of a program shuffle last week I managed to get back on schedule with my MHFS 10k Training Program

As I mentioned, I had to shift the 10 mile session to Saturday, but when it got to Friday night I had decided it would be best to get this out of the way so I can relax on Saturday. So when I got home I went out for a 10 mile run, leaving from my house.

It was an interesting run, not long into it I encountered a few 12 year olds walking towards me, clearly struggling with the idea of leaving me to run without abuse. As I ran past the little guys they didn’t move over, instead I had to run through the middle of them. The guy in the middle (who I knew was going to get smart), said “What you don’t trip!” as he stuck his leg out in front of me. What’s wrong with these kids? They not realise I am twice their size? I hurdled his leg and carried on with my run, giving them a bit of a stare as I ran on.

I decided to do a similar run to the one I had done with Ann, only doing 2 loops of Manse Brae-Hallside-Newton, to add to the distance. At the end of my first loop as I came up Manse Brae ( a pretty long and steep hill ) I approached a group of teenagers out enjoying the friday night sun with some cigarettes and Buckfast and said “Wish I could still do that”, with that they said I’d be more than welcome to, but I thought it best to keep with the program and get the run over. Besides, I’m not really a Buckfast drinker, I was talking more about the lazing around the country side smoking cigs and drinking beer aspect.

On my 2nd loop I came back up Manse Brae and could see the guys I’d been talking to before. This time they were waiting to talk to me so I took a rest and stopped to have a chat. They had been trying to figure out my job, and I said “computer programmer”, one of them said he had guessed that as to be able to run after work I must have a desk job. We chatted about running/smoking etc and how they could do it if they felt like it. They seemed genuinely impressed with my run, and said, “You must be fit as f**k, you look fit as f**k” Which I took as a compliment. Anyway, after a few minutes I got back to my run and did the last 3 miles to get home.

Total distance: 9:92 miles, time 1hr 33mins - ( stopped for a few mins )

Average of approx 9:00 min/miles again, which was a comfortable speed for me over this distance.

On Saturday morning I decided it was time for Dylan to try a solo run, so off we went to the park and he went off to do 2 laps solo a distance of 1.1 miles. He completed the distance in a good time, first lap 6:06, second lap 6:11. That’s pretty much the speed we have been training at, so good effort.

My brother Graeme also txt me yesterday to let me know he’s now back on track with his 10k training and managed to do a 10k training run in 54:45… given he’s not done a hell of a lot of training, he’ll be faster than me soon. That’s his PB too.

And my Mum, she’s completed 2 weeks of her new training regime and seems to be enjoying it. It won’t be long before we see her out on a 10k run!

I’ve decided to stop smoking again, I dunno what’s wrong with me but after managing to stop for 13 months until Oct last year, I’ve slowly flirted with them until they are a full part of my life again. More recently I’ve been smoking a lot more and finally had one at work on Friday. So I have decided enough is enough and I’ve stopped, not smoking all day yesterday. Last night when I was starting to crave I went out for a run instead @ 10.30pm for a 3 mile recovery run. This did 2 things, it took my mind off the cravings/pangs, which are mild anyway, and helped me get my training program back to where it should be. Now that I’m not on the cigs anymore I am looking forward to each run more as I will be able to breathe a little easier.

This is a fairly light week in the run up to my race, my next run is a 2 mile recovery on Tuesday, then a 5 mile tempo run on Thursday. Not long to go now!! Then I can start figuring out what I’m going to train for next. It’s looking like the Glasgow 1/2 marathon in September though.