Twin Peaks 2014

After a fairly long childcare-led sabbatical from racing, I finally got a chance to don the blue vest at the local 'Aberystwyth Twin Peaks' race, a tough mixed terrain Welsh classic.

The event had been organised by my running mate Ian Evans, his first stab at race organising and despite being nervous beforehand, he put on a great show, one of the best Twin Peaks yet, ably assisted by freak mid-summer like conditions in early October. The local surge in people taking up running also showed, with lots of new faces meaning a record entry for the race and in addition, all the family and friends that come with them, to create a great atmosphere on the promenade.

Race start

My previous outings in 2014 had been the Teifi 10, Island Race (HM), Tregaron Duathlon & Castles Relay (12m), all in the first half of the year, but the trusty Parkrun and a good summer of training meant that fitness was good and it would just be a case of finding out whether the form was there on the day.

It was also my first year since 2010 without a Spring marathon. Whether this was a good thing or not remained to be seen.

A reccy was carried out the previous week with first timer, nephew Llyr. I'd worked out some mile splits which always sets my mind at rest (to know the course like the back of my hand). One less thing to worry about on the day.

Looking back through some previous Twin Peaks races via my Garmin data (I love this kind of retrospective analysis), I realised that my hill work had been ok in the past but my downhill and maybe even the pace on the flats needed some work.

This meant the plan was to start at full gas for once, minus maybe a couple of percent, and slacken off on 'Dogshit alley' in readiness for the first slog of the day, Pendinas Hill.

My plan kind of worked. I wanted a fast first mile but it seemed that the quality field all had fresh legs on the day and we set off at a seemingly brisk but sensible pace, only for the mile one split to read 5.39, way faster than even my 5km pace. This felt very comfortable at the time and so I decide to go for it and try & stay at the back of the lead group.

Mile 2, which ended just at the foot of Pendinas was another cracker at 6 minutes, and I'd even lost a couple of places which didn't alarm me too much. I was almost one minute up on my schedule after two miles, something had to give.....

Pendinas starts steep, levels out and then kicks again towards the summit. The first kick saw me hold back and run with my group, which by this point had thinned out, with the leaders making their way ahead of us. I began to overtake runners on the less steep middle section and was running 9th as we headed for the top.

The last kick was a brute and the guy in front started to walk. Psychologically, this wasn't good for me. I was in pain and saw this as a great chance to copy him, and to try and stop the burn. I did, and never really recovered.

I'd gone over the red line, and plummeting down the descent, I was out of control, lucky not to turn an ankle or slip on my back as I just didn't have the core strength to keep myself stable. Not to worry, I just thought of how fast Richard Anthony would be snowballing down behind me, and managed to keep a good pace going through the off-camber footpath whilst being chased by a couple of runners I'd past on the ascent.

Back onto the road for mile four and the legs had gone into lactic shock and I felt like I was operating at 50% power, probably due to the fast start! We've all been there and it's a test of will to convince your body to snap out of it and get going again. I thought of the old 3 min max. sprint tests on the bike that the University lab carried out a few years back. This showed that even after a maximal sprint effort where you die by minute two, you actually start producing more power again in minute three, despite the sensation of doom that you're going at snails pace...

I looked up and saw that the guys in front were in the same boat, we were all running in slow motion compared to the outward prom leg, it was just a case of hanging on. The 3 min theory did work in my opinion, and I felt a bit stronger as we headed to climb two. My Garmin had lost GPS at mile three frustratingly and so I can't analyse the negative split in great detail much to my annoyance.

'Consti' is another tough climb, albeit shorter than Pendinas, and years of efforts up there taught me in my hour of need, not to look up, focus on the three twisty corners at the bottom before crossing the two bridges and then the final slog through the rocky section to the summit. It was 'orrible. I walked, I looked up to see others walking, I looked down to see that I had ample gap to the guys & girls behind me but I still wanted to keel over. I asked a marshal where the collapse mattress was.. If you're cooked, no hill training in the world can help you speed up. I trotted and eventually forced myself to run again, cheered on by the crowd at the top, and plodded up to the access road at the very top and managed to catch up with one other runner to start the descent.
 My timer was still working and so I knew how long we had to descend back to the prom in order to try and dip below the magical 50 minute mark for a PB and it was going to be close, probably too close. I bombed down, again in a Richard Anthony esque' style, almost falling into the sea at the bottom of the ramp, with my knees and shins still reminding me of this almost a week and a half later. I didn't hit the prom with enough time to spare to run to the finish in the time required,and was duly re-caught by my companion in the yellow shirt that I'd left on the descent.

The legs had gone but I managed a glimmer of a sprint to come home with a PB by 17 seconds, at 50.22 for 12th place on the day. I reckon a sub 50 is possible next year, just hold off a tad in that first mile!

It's in the post

Blog 1 of a marathon training diary that should see me through to the Flora London Marathon on April the sumthing 2011.
After winning a lucky dip style draw within the Aberystwyth Athletic Club to run for the club in next years event, I finally filled in the relevent paperwork last night and and waved goodbye to 41 british pence for the stamp and twenty eight pounds for the entry fee, so as they say, there's no turning back now.

Fellow Aber AC runner Dan Burgess also won a spot. We are of similar age, ability and also posses fairly equal amounts of excess body hair, so I guess it's nice that we get to train and run together in the same edition of the race.

I've been submitting an entry for this race for years, with the thinking that I'll drop everything and go for it should my number ever come up. It's not me, or maybe it is now that I am getting longer in the tooth. The old me would complain about the length of a 400 sprint effort on a Tuesday night speed session. 10k was my absolute performance limit and 10 milers were done with no feeling from the waist down.

So i want to do it well, thats my new professional attitude speaking. If i manage it remains to be seen. My shins haven't got the best track record thanks to my plain refusal to wear moulded shoe inserts as a 5 year old which were meant to cure my flat feet. We'll see how it goes.

I started running again after a summer of doing my first choice sport of cycling. After the Teifi 10 in May, I didn't run anywhere apart from the Spar on Northgate Street, from Cambrian Tyres on er, Northgate Street until September the 7th, so although fit, my running muscles were in hibernation.

I've been rudely awakening them gradually as per most winters, Tuesday speed night and one other run usually at the weekend. It suddenly dawned on me that this is nowhere near enough for the Marathon. For 10k's yes maybe, but this required more, much more.

So I've been forcing myself to run at weekends for no less than one hour, without any stops and at a fairly fast pace of about 7.30 min miling pace. It's hard but doable (just), but the problem is recovery. My calves hurt, hips, knees etc etc. I'm putting it down to 'adaption' from cycling, and into week three of this new four times a week regime, the shins are creaking but there are no major issues to report.

Last Tuesday night was a pyramid session at Erw Goch. Brian Ashton insistst that I keep up with speed work as it will improve my stride and enable me to push on and change pace should I need to on the big day, and who am I to argue, the man has run well under three hours for a marathon and so I'll take all his knowledge in as red.

I was volunteered into the group containing the club fastmen and we zoomed around at a good pace, some efforts done at sub 5 min pace! : http://connect.garmin.com/activity/57753153

That free Powerbar i nabbed from a customer at work did it's job and enabled me to do the second set of intervals at the same pace as the first - nice and consistant.

I haven't yet set a target time for London. I'm going to give the thing the utmost respect. I know people who've crashed & burned, who are far better runners than me. It's double the distance I've ever run before but on the other hand, I''ve been racing road bikes for the best part of 20 years, I've completed the Welsh Road Race Champs twice, in 1992 and 2005 when it was flat out for four hours, over 100 miles of pain, and the Dragon Ride in 2010 in 6hours 21 minutes!! So why am I scared? Because it's bone jarring running, unlike cycling where the bike takes the road shock. I'm thinking 6 hours on the bike is around the same on the body as a 3hour marathon would be.....

Time to get for an easy 5 miles, I'm full of lurgy but it's not life threatening so I'll plod on & write some more when there is sufficient progress!!!