Running to Think: summary

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Sunday, 27 April 2014

Summary of week 15

Two weeks after the not-easy-at-all 80 km of Paris, the only purpose has been to get back to the road with an easy pace and relax as much as possible.

7/04/2014

9 km on the hills of Sart Tilman. I must admit that I've been running easy here. Hills were not scary but I never tried to attack one. I also found a new path, quite steep, that will probably be a new friend in the near future.

8/04/2014

Whenever I go back to Leuven and plan a running session there, I accept the fact that there will be no hills at all. A peaceful 12 km run is definitely a relaxing one.

9/04/2014

I recently decided to commute to feet, from bike. This means that I am planning to run to work every morning. The transition is taking a while, due to technical problems I will write about. A total run of 15 km from home to the station to the office and back.

10/04/2014

Easy easy easy: 6 km and a lot of stretching. I need it!

11/04/2014

When Caroline wants to go to the sea, that's clearly an order I cannot deny. The only thing I can do is packing my stuff, lock a pair of shoes on the back pack and drive to the belgian sea. The first thing I've been doing after parking the car was a 12 km by the sea. Pretty windy up there!

12/04/2014

Wake up, get a light breakfast and run. These are the rules when I am at the sea. A windy 10 km run, indeed.

13/04/2014

Last day of the weekend doesn't really mean that I should run at a faster pace than the previous days. For some reason I have been running a 21 km at the steady pace of 4' per km. Quite flat, quite windy. A lot of sun. Loved it!

Total milage 85km

Tuesday, 25 March 2014

Summary of week 12

Unknown 09:47:00 eco trail paris , schedule 0 Comments

A boring week with total mileage of 75 km.

19/03/2014
After a fast recovery from the trip back from Spain, I finally met my hills in Liege Sart Tilman. They gave me a painful welcome though: half marathon on steep irregular terrain. A tumble on the ground started something that I still feel: pain between the left rhomboid and the spine.

20/03/2014
Easy pace 12 km run, even though in Sart Tilman nothing is really easy.

22/03/2014
Really not in the mood to go out. The pain of the rhomboid is killing me. Finished 10 miles on the treadmill. Quite boring.

23/03/2014
Rhomboid slightly less painful. I cannot appreciate any running session with this.
18 km with intervals on 400 mt.

Pain pain pain, and there is only one week before the Eco Trail Paris 80 km...

Summary of week 11

Unknown 09:28:00 schedule , summary 0 Comments

Nothing special happened in week 11. Just feeling closer to race day and slightly more stressed.
Weekly total mileage: 85 km.

11/03/2014
A very easy run in the morning. 10 km on the usual dusty road near El Goloso, Madrid.
At 6pm I realised that the fridge was quite empty and needed to go shopping. Thing is that the house where I was living is 4 km out of town. I turned the hydration pack into something that could carry some vegetables and rice. Evening run of 8 km.

13/03/2014
Things usually get serious on thursday. Interval training on the distance of 2 km, 5 times with minimal rest. Exhausting.

14/03/2014
Easy pace 10 km run. Preparing for sunday.

15/03/2014
Interval training on the distance of 400mt with a total mileage of 17 km at average pace of 4':30" per km.

16/03/2014
Last run to El Pardo. It needed to be fast. But the previous training sessions kicked in since the beginning. Not bad though: 25km on the hills of El Pardo, below 2h

Monday, 17 March 2014

Summary of week 10

Unknown 15:46:00 running , schedule 0 Comments

Another week of trail running around Madrid; another week of 120 km and 9400 kcal burned to convince myself that I am ready for the 80k of Paris. I started this week doing something I would have liked to do a while ago: resting.

03/03/2014

04/03/2014 intervals on a longer distance of 3km for a total run of 23 km. Really cool interval session. Tough but lovely. If you know what I mean.

05/03/2014 23 km from Cantoblanco to Alcobendas at a quite fast pace that I was keeping since the very beginning. Today I tried the new outfit I will wear during the 80km in Paris. New stuff needs to be tested first because I'm really not in the mood of having getting surprises the Day. Caroline following me by bike did the rest.

06/03/2014 10 km easy run with some drills on the trail towards El Pardo, once residence of Franco. Kind of mine, today.

07/03/2014 17 km a long and tedious interval training on 400 mt on the road, to be added to the usual mileage to go back home.

08/03/2014 quite dumb legs, as expected. I decided to stay at home and save some energy for the ultra distance of tomorrow.

09/03/2014 easy run to El Pardo and back to Cantoblanco. Caroline joined me by bike in the second part to cover the distance of 44 km. I remember this run to be a bit boring. At some point I really felt the need to talk to someone. Luckily I met another runner who decided to overtake me at a slightly higher pace. Of course I didn't let him go. Not to challenge him. I just needed some company. We started running at a faster pace of 4:20" per km. I didn't tell him that I had been running for 30 km already, not to get his mercy :)

Monday, 17 February 2014

Summary of week 6 (and other things)

Unknown 20:55:00 italy , marathon 0 Comments

Attempt to finish a marathon in Italy (~km 18)

The amount of work and the unexpected happenings of every day life didn't give me much time to write some lines any time soon. Better late than never, of course.
Year 2014 already had the flavour of an intense year full of things to take care of and targets to achieve. And that feeling was not wrong at all.

My running activity is taking the scary pace of the competitive phase. The race of the year is getting closer and closer, being now only two months far. I have been increasing the mileage quite smoothly after the injury to the posterior tibial tendon, fixed in no time (a record in my career).
I started running a bit everywhere between the hills of Sart Tilman and the flat lands around Leuven.
What made week 6 though was an unexpected trip to my hometown in Puglia, south of Italy. Caroline and I found and booked a flight in the time I need to run 1 mile and prepared the luggage in much less than that. It was that fast!
The trip to Italy was amazing. Great food, great places to visit, great weather and, of course, a lot of miles to run.
On the day dedicated to the long distance training I felt so good that I was about to complete a full marathon. Blisters under three toes of the right foot put an end to my attempt at the 40th km.

Attempt to finish a marathon in Italy (~km 20)

I rested a bit only one day, to give some time to the blisters to get dry. Some good taping and special plasters fixed everything in a bit more than one night. Those are the benefits of having a girlfriend on my side who is into sports and nutrition as a profession.

After two days I was back on the road and did some interval training on 1000 meters. The pace was unexpectedly high, around 3'30" per km.
It seems that I can keep the intensity of the schedule after those two weeks in which I was forced to stay at home due to the injury. I can claim that it is true: giving the body some rest regenerates it and prepares it to the worse. Or the best.

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