watson - that sucks, good luck with the new opportunities.

Mark - nice race.

piwi - thanks...my cold is starting to come on strong today.  I'm going to do my shake out shortly but at this point I'm 50-50 about whether I'll be racing tomorrow.  I'm currently feeling quite hot and fever-ish and the body is aching a bit but I don't feel too bad.  But to race at 100% I need to feel better than this.  If the best I can hope for is a 1:35-40 with some suffering, followed by getting sicker, I won't go.  It's a big call because I've been waiting for this for over a year and I know how many others on here would love the chance to race.

Special thanks to the d**kheads who came to work when they were sick in the last week.

Yep 16:14 at Parkrun, it was pretty windy out there and due to some of the fences from the remediation work still being there, they had to make a last minute course change (this meant 3 u-turns which is not ideal for a 5k).  Legs were feeling the 20k MP workout from Wed a bit, so I never really hit top gear - had a good rhythm going but never quite hit the 5k wall of death.  I was hoping to beat the course record (16:04) which a club mate set but with the wind and the u-turns it wasn't the day for it today.

Steve - DOH!!! Fingers crossed for you.  So annoying when people come into work when they're sick - WTF is sick leave for?!?!

Watson - bummer, it's tough times in a lot of sectors at the moment.  Hopefully those other opportunities come through for you.

This was a blah sort of week - I got in my miles, didn’t feel good but not all that bad either.  My “easy” miles were neither hard nor particularly easy, just slow and steady.  Most days weren’t quite as hot as they’ve been, but still warm & humid.  My new pair of Reebok Forever Floatride Energys, which I’ll use for runs of 10+ miles and hills, felt fine.  I got to 300 miles in my last pair of Nike Lunar Tempos (discontinued in 2015) that I’ve been using for recovery runs and will start using my last pair of Lunar Tempo 2s (discontinued in 2016 or 2017) next week.  Looking forward to my 5K in three weeks, and to some shorter & faster running between now & then.

Sun - off

Mon - 12.1 easy

Tues - 7.7 slow, too tired for strides 

Weds - 10.7 easy

Thurs - 24 minutes swimming

Fri - 12.1 easy

Sat - 8 easy including strides

Total - about 50.6 miles

12/26/52-week averages - 46/44/38 mpw

James - nice work, no doubt you're looking forward to racing!

Piwi - another consistent week, not a bad idea to throw a down week in next week, still a bit of time before the race at the end of the month.

Me - 1 more week in the bag.  I'm really looking forward to racing at the end of the month as it feels like this training block has gone on forever, which I guess is what happens is when you're targeting a marathon and then have to swap it for another one 4 months later!  But still, a really good long MP workout mid-week, and nice to throw a bit of speed in there with Parkrun on Saturday.  I had two days off running this week and will probably do the same next week before cranking it up for a couple weeks before Mt. Maunganui Half.

Weekly for period: From: 27/07/2020 To 02/08/2020

Total distance: 100.21km

James, Piwi and Mark - nice weeks.

Piwi - maybe ONE down week might be a good idea.

My week was ok.  I'd recovered enough from my sore throat / cold, that I started running.  I took things very easy early in the week, but still was quite sore - one week off made a big difference in my recovery.  This coming week should be good.

Weekly for period: From: 27/07/2020 To 02/08/2020

Total distance: 38.80km

Mark looked like Taupo was a little long this year. I'm seeing 21.3 on most Strava feeds. Funny thing on their website they have explained course measurement and why everyone was reading short ( must be from previous years  ) They must have over compensated or maybe I'm putting too much faith in our gps watches 

I had it short both times I ran it. Like 20.9ish I think. Not really any excuse to get the length of that course wrong - it doesn’t have a lot of tight corners and worst case you just move the turnaround point! But these are the same race organisers that don’t provide cups now either and require runners to carry their own...

Agree with Darkwave in that 21.3km on GPS may just be GPS error plus not running the perfect lines.  Out of the half's that I've run where I trust the accuracy, they've ranged from 21.05 km to 21.33 km on my watch.  My watch tends to run a little bit shorter than most other peoples watches - my most recent race was 7.99km on my watch, but everyone else was 8.0x on Strava.

Cant resist a measurement discussion.

I havent run a single course that is certified where my GPS showed up short. Not a single one. Maybe you guys run some goofy courses with a ton of L turns and turnaround pints where that could happen, but otherwise, it means the course isn't accurate (unless its just one or two people's watches). Even on relatively straight courses for a person (me) who is really about the SPR, it's hard to measure short. The only time I get right on the money is during these time trials, when I'm by myself and can fully ignore weaving around anybody.