That's it, no more running advice from me...
 

Just had my arse handed to me by my girlfriend.

45 minutes of trail run and I felt like death warmed up for 33 minutes of it.

I could use a myriad of excuses. But I won't. I'll just bitterly and resentfully harbour them at the back of my mind.

Showed her who was boss by outsprinting her on the home descent but then I was a wing in rugby and she had previously had to stop 5 times to wait for me.

Ego suitably crushed. She's a blinding girl.

Here's my advice....always run with someone much slower than you....helps the ego!

As the cavemen say "You don't have to outrun the T-rex....just be faster than the slowest one in the group..."

Thanks for the kind words MOD.

Barney the Dinosaur would have kicked my arse last night.

interval runs. my wife could probably beat me in a straight up distance run (if we ever did that). instead we just do interval runs ranging in various mileages. fartlek runs are also good.

If it makes you feel better.....a once younger OD decided to try spring track in HS to keep in shape for hockey season. Not a natural gifted runner he picked the absolutely shortest differences. Apparently young OD was not aware of the massive power and speed it took to run 100 yards....hence finishing dead last every meet. Having his pride hurt the ever so ambitious OD decided to attempt a longer run he felt he could maintain and finish with his head held high. Talking with the coach, young OD came up with the notion of "how hard can it be to run a mile...". And so the next meet came where he stood on the mile race starting line...unsure of any strategy to run the race....and then the gun sounded.....Lap 1....really excellent time, in fact ahead of state champion runners on the first lap alone, could this really be his call to glory finally....Lap 2, with the crowd chanting "Slow Down!", young OD knew that at this pace it was possible to break records so why would he want to do that....unfortunately the pack began to close in...in 3rd......Lap 3....well a mile is a long long long way apparently...and the body of young OD was starting to have issues with his continued effort.....so things started to turn for the worse.....mid pack.......Lap 4.....The crowd had never seen a runner with a blue face and dragging arms on the track while running......End of race.....Young OD with a mighty effort collapsed across the finish line....bleeding knuckles.....only to have everyone run up around him....and burst out laughing.....dead last in heat of 30 runners.....the story still lives on to this day.....

I used to work with a guy who was in the Corps. When he was 19 he ran the 3 mile test in just under 18 minutes. The Master Sargeant was unimpressed. He said, "I'll beat you in 3 mile race. As soon as the race starts, I'll grab you and beat you to a bloody pulp, then take my time on the run." Of course, I don't recommend that with the girlfriend. They're usually kind of funny about that stuff.

I think mostly what is in place here is that while I have been pontificating to Allen about how to run, my own running has gone to shit.

Oh no James, say it ain't so. The pontificating has been working well for me so far.

I'm doing great following your pontifications a few months ago and now, let's not speak about the lack of following in the months between.

If only this life thing would stop getting in the way of training!

Well we are now entering our autumn (not that we actually had a summer) and the conditions in which I prefer to run are returning. If I could get the cooler evenings but the sun stayed put until about 9pm then everything would be perfect.

I repeated the route on which I had my arse kicked (ROWIHMAK) over a week ago on my own ... and actually ran it slower by about two minutes. I also used my Garmin Forerunner and it was about half a mile shorter than I'd estimated.

The Forerunner had me running at a pretty slow pace but it is totally inaccurate round here. Warning if you consider buying one.

But I felt much more comfortable rather than being close to spontaneous human combustion, some of the trickier bits of the trail were in almost complete darkness so I had to walk a little to find my way through some undergrowth and I hit my top gear for the home run much earlier.

So, good and bad. But mainly good.

Then I went out on Monday night and did a 3 mile benchmark run and coasted a PB. Thought I was running slowly. That time had stood for about 4 years. And nothing ached afterwards.

Did a 5 minute on, 1 minute off for 30 minutes session yesterday and covered a pretty decent distance.

Lesson: Lots of sprints, circuits, cycling, conditioning stuff etc. do not translate to banging out 10k times with impunity. Build up to it.

I will retest the ROWIHMAK in a few weeks and I WILL eventually knock 10 minutes off my time. And my girlfriend will suffer.