Competitive Jerks Racing and Training - 2023 (Read 549 times)

mmerkle is the real deal. Imo he has the ability to go well under 2:40 in a few years time if he chooses to continue running marathons and his training stays consistent. Congrats! 👍

mmerkle crushes it with a monster 2:56! Way to go!!

YES!!!!!!!!!!!!

Congrats mmerkle! Great feeling when hard work results in great result! Waiting for race report!

Congrats Andy!

Andy - way to go, congrats!!

Mark, Steve, Flavio - solid weeks, all.

Me - good enough, a relatively uneventful week, which is what you want at this point. I pushed out my workout a day, in consideration of 10k recovery from the previous weekend. I figured it might still be a bit rough, but if anything the reps were actually a bit faster than usual. The MP run was somewhat inconclusive—a couple of the early miles were hilly, then my GPS went a little haywire. But I think it’s all fine.

I’m more concerned about the weather—as of a few days ago, they were forecasting a cooldown, but now they’re showing it getting warm. Dammit. Hopefully it will change back!

Weekly for period: From: 09/04/2023 To 09/10/2023

Totals: Time: 07:47:30 - 🦅Imperial: 54.33 mi - Metric: 87.42 km

Where is everyone seeing mmerkle's result?  2:56 in probably less than ideal conditions again is a stunner.  I agree with mikkey that the sky is the limit.

Andy - Great effort too, that's a big chunk of time off the PR.  It's raining PRs around here.

Dave - Good to see you're in the weather obsessing stage, you must be ready.

Edit: So I decided to check Melbourne weather, it's only 13 days out after all.  Race day has a max of 17C (63F) and probably much cooler at 7:45am so that sounds good.  The concerning thing is every day between now and 3 days out from the race is 26C (79F) so a small shift could push that out to race day.  That's way too hot for someone coming out of a Christchurch winter...

Keen - Minor point, my half is on September 24, I may have steered you wrong on that one.

Flavio - Well done gutsing out the week, how is the fatigue now?  Hagley is designed to fire up my Vo2 Max system one more time pre-race.  I'll probably have a bit of fatigue in my legs.  Coach has given the instruction as simply "run hard".  He did say he wouldn't be surprised to see a PR, but that he doesn't expect I'll get close to what he thinks I can do for 5km (he's actually talking sub 18).  Having said that, he puts times on all workouts in Training Peaks and he put 18:15...I think best case is 18:40-50.  He might even get the chance to pace me which he wasn't going to do this time since he did the Dunedin Marathon yesterday...or did he?  As posted in the other thread, this is the message he sent our group.  Shambles.

Hey team. A bit of an update for those who are interested & wondering how coaches day went  Running nice and comfortable today up the front. Following the lead vehicle as you do. Unfortunately after about 18km the driver pulled over and let me know I’d run well past the turn around point and he’d made bit of a booboo. (I ran an extra 4.6km) They then suggested I get in the car and they drop me back at the front of the race . Obviously I wasn’t ok with that idea, so just decided to run to where Sarah was waiting with a bottle, called it a good tempo for the day. Considered running to 42.2 on my watch, but figured I can’t call that a pb anyway, so not worth the cost on the body. A little gutted just because I felt like I was having a really effortless run, but wasn’t really all that keen to run the Dunedin ultra today  They race director and staff were and are incredibly embarrassed about it all. One of them even cried  Anyway. Shit happens, felt nice to move well atleast!

He must have been going at around 2:20 pace so must have been feeling amazing since he wasn't expecting much for this race.  The "winner" finished in 2:34.  Earlier this year another guy in our group was leading in a half and missed an awkward out and back because there was no official placed on the crucial corner.  He got back to the athletics track and realised he was almost 2km short so had no choice but to disqualify himself.  Would you believe it, the "winner" that day was the same guy who got the win in Dunedin yesterday.

mmerkle is the real deal. Imo he has the ability to go well under 2:40 in a few years time if he chooses to continue running marathons and his training stays consistent. Congrats! 👍

Agreed.   He's figured the marathon out, and is young enough to improve a lot from here.

Andy- didn't mean to exclude you.  Congratulations to you as well.  Over a minute off of your 10K time is pretty cool.

Dave - nice week and fingers crossed for better weather.  That GPS is weird.  Refresh me on your goal marathon pace?

Flavio- good point about the media, though I do still follow some.  Media is for profit, and so they cover the news in a way that will generate the most views and revenue.  And usually that means focusing on the more divisive topics.

That looked like a very solid week, BTW.

I'll drop two weeks here, since I was missing last week:

My two weeks:

63 miles running, 2 hours pool-running, and 1000 yards swimming.
M: 6 miles trail-running (11:04) and streaming yoga
T: 10 miles, with a track workout of 2x(1600, 800)+2x400 - splits were 7:07, 3:25, 6:53, 3:21, 1:39, and 1:38 (recoveries of 5:43 and 6:01 after the 1600s and 3:0x after the 800s, with 74 second recovery between the 400s). Followed with leg strengthwork and 500 yards recovery swimming.
W: 10 miles easy (9:25) plus drills and strides, and then upper body weights/core
Th: 2 hours pool-running and streaming yoga
F: 17 miles, with 2x5 miles at marathon effort in 37:47 and 37:44 (7:33 pace each) with 1 mile float in 8:27 between. Followed with injury prevention work and 500 yards recovery swimming
Sa: 8 miles trail-running (10:27) and streaming pilates
Su: 12 miles easy to aerobic (8:58) plus upper body weights/core

69 miles running, 90 minutes pool-running, and 1000 yards swimming.
M: 90 minutes pool-running and streaming yoga
T: 10 miles, including a track workout of 5x1000, 400, 2x200 in 4:23, 4:15, 4:08, 4:07, 4:07 and then 95, 46, and 46. 2:4x-3:0x recovery after the 1000s, 90 seconds recovery between the 400 and 200s. Followed with leg strengthwork
W: 11 miles very easy (9:28) with drills and uphill/downhill strides. Streaming yoga in afternoon
Th: 7 miles trail-running (10:19) and upper body weights/core
F: 10 miles, including a 6400m track tempo in 28:02 (7:14/6:58/6:56/6:54). Followed with leg strengthwork and 500 yards recovery swimming.
Sa: 12.5 miles very easy (9:10) plus drills and uphill/downhill strides, and then streaming pilates.
Su: 18 miles progressive, split as the first 6 miles averaging 9:48 pace, the next 5 miles averaging 8:23, and then the next 7 miles averaging 7:39 pace, plus a half-mile cooldown jog. Followed with injury prevention work and 500 yards recovery swimming.

Last two weeks of marathon training.   A few quick notes:

-I'm modifying my default schedule to have one day of pool-running instead of two, with the second day converted to a trail run.  This is because both feel the same on my body in terms of stress, and I don't want to yield my easy days on pavement, as I feel there's a lot of benefit from them in terms of keeping my body used to the harder surfaces.

-I ran some bloodwork the week before this one and noted that my iron was really low again.  I'm not anemic, just iron deficient.  Not totally surprising, because I had gotten lax about the iron supplements.  So I started those up again, and my interval paces improved nicely.

flavio - great running! I agree - media is the worst in any country now - I read previously both, Russian and American media, both suck in the same way

steve, marky - nice weeks too!

mmmerkle - once again - great job, awesome progress trajectory - keep it!

Dave - great pre-marathon week! Your cycle was great - hopefully you will get what you target for!

DW - awesome weeks as always lately - hopefully you will have great marathon coming!

Andy - congrats on PR!

I had a surprisingly decent week. I think Brad Hudson has something to do with it - he is a proponent of modifying your plans depending on how you feel - I didn't plan on this kind of week, but Hudson is to blame

Weekly for period: From: 09/04/2023 To 09/10/2023

Totals: Time: 15:08:24 - 🦅Imperial: 104.57 mi - Metric: 168.25 km

Steve, Mark, Flavio, Dave, DWave - Nice weeks.

Steve - That really sucks for your coach!

DWave - I take it you don't each much red meat and/or cook with cast iron?

Cal - Back to posting big weeks!

Week #7 above 100 miles. I've been getting over some petty annoyance of a bug for the past  4-5 days - I have some sinus congestion in the mornings only (running seems to help this) and it seems like my battery only charges to 85% or so. Not that I'm low energy throughout the day, just that I start getting more fatigued than usual by 6-7pm. I've kept a careful eye on my HR, and for all my runs it has been right where I'd expect it to be even without whatever little bug this is.

Weekly for period: From: 09/04/2023 To 09/10/2023

Totals: Time: 15:36:23 - 🦅Imperial: 107.03 mi - Metric: 172.21 km